1845
ink
paper
From the collection of Metropolitan Museum of Art
Untitled is a 1845 ink by Utagawa Kuniyoshi, a Romanticism work, depicting Mountain, held at Metropolitan Museum of Art.
This print shows a riverside scene at dusk. A man in green kneels by the water, sweeping with a broom. Two women in yellow sit under a wooden porch, one resting her head on her hand. Across the river, another person walks with a bundle. The background has dark mountains, a few trees, and a lantern hanging near the porch. The sky is pale, and the water looks calm. Notice the sharp contrast between the busy foreground and the quiet river. The text on the right side is in Japanese, adding a layer of storytelling. Look up cross-hatching next to see how artists build texture with lines.
Kuniyoshi grew up in old Tokyo when the city was still called Edo. His dad ran a silk shop, but Kuniyoshi loved anything with pictures—scrolls, screens, comic books. He talked his way into the Utagawa school, a kind of…
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