Friday, November 12, 2021

Utagawa Kuniyoshi postcard from Japan

This Postcrossing postcard from Yoshiko, a castle and Moomins fan in Japan, brought some good cheer amid a busy and stressful workweek. 

It features the work of Japanese artist Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1798-1861). Yoshiko writes, "This card is an ukiyo-e print. ... It's unusual to draw a cat. She is brushing her's [sic] cat's hair. I hope you like it."

Ukiyo-e, which dates to the 17th century, is a style of woodblock prints and paintings. The term itself translates to "pictures of the floating world," which is quite beautiful. You can see many examples of this colorful style of art on Wikipedia.

Kuniyoshi's ukiyo-e subjects included cats, women, actors, landscapes and mythical creatures. He made this amazeballs triptych titled "Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre." Imagine having a large print of this on your wall!

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