喜多川歌麿画 鮑取り|Abalone Divers
1788
ink
From the collection of Metropolitan Museum of Art
1788
ink
From the collection of Metropolitan Museum of Art
喜多川歌麿画 鮑取り|Abalone Divers is a 1788 ink by Kitagawa Utamaro, a Romanticism work, depicting bathing, held at Metropolitan Museum of Art.
You see two women in the ocean, their bodies half-hidden by waves, reaching for abalone shells. Utamaro carved the scene onto wood blocks, then printed each color one at a time. The waves look like they’re moving because the lines are curved and layered—a trick called cross-hatching. The women’s poses feel real, not posed, like a snapshot of daily work. If you like this, look up more prints in the subject: women, female nudes, japan.
