Kuniyoshi 国芳: Beauty and Falling Leaves; Clearing Weather at Mama

Artist: Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1798-1861)Title: Clearing weather at Mama (Mama no seiran, 真間晴嵐) Series: Virtuous Women for the Eight Views (Kenjo hakkei, 賢女八景) Date: 1842-43 A young woman looks behind her, the wind stirring her festive garments and blowing falling maple leaves all around. She appears to be very young and seems dressed for a festival. She wears a furisode, a kimono with long sleeves reserved for the young, and has a cheerful miniature fan as a hair ornament. The garment features a water-wheel pattern. Robinson refers to this woman as “the faithful wife of Mama”, but she seems dressed as an unmarried woman. The poem above may be one from the Man’yoshu, the 8th century anthology of poetry, as it contains a the story of the Maiden Tegona of Mama, a beautiful young woman who met a tragic fate. Hiroshige’s view of maple leaves at Mama –one of the more famous designs in “100 Famous Views of Edo”–was published about 15 years after this series. The Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang