Page 425 - Edo: Art in Japan, 1615–1868

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234
The Rope Curtain
c. 16405
Two-panel folding screen
(left panel added at later date); ink,
color, and gold on paper
7
159.7 x 180.6 (62 /s x 71 Ys)
The Arc-en-Ciel Foundation, Tokyo
Important Cultural Property

Illustrated page 379

424 • A courtesan gently parts the rope
curtain at a bordello entrance, linger-
ing quietly after having bid farewell
to a patron. The courtesan's pet dog,
animated and yelping, draws attention
to her silent brooding. The elegance
of the woman's garments, decorated
with trailing strands of flowering
wisteria against stylized waves, her
dramatic hyôgo mage coiffure, and her
stately presence suggest she is a tayu,
the highest rank of courtesan of the
Kyoto pleasure quarters. Her left hand
is tucked into her sleeve, a convention
found in numerous examples of bijin 235 Fine robes had always been an impor-
(beautiful woman) paintings of this
Whose Sleeves? tant accoutrement of Japanese aristo-
period. The entire scene is suffused cratic culture, but during the early
with an aura of quiet dispassion. Early seventeenth century modern period — an era when many
Two-panel screen; ink, color, and
The unsigned painting is the work of gold on paper status symbols were still denied to
highly skilled town painter. Its empha- 149.5 x 162 (58 /s x 63 /4) members of the merchant class —
3
7
sis on the figure rather than the setting Private Collection, Kyoto the nouveaux riches expended much
anticipates developments in ukiyoe money on robes. Images of elegant
tradition. The left panel, consisting of 236 robes played on the vanity associated
nothing but a bamboo curtain (sudare), with ostentatious fashion.
Whose Sleeves?
was added at a later date. Both panels Poems on the theme of "whose
make allusion to visual screens Middle to late seventeenth century sleeves?" can be traced to the Heian
that obscure vision, but only partly. Two six-panel screens; ink, color, court, where the language of gar-
Numerous passages in classical and gold on paper ments was fraught with social, politi-
Japanese literature record accounts Each 149 x 347.8 (58Vs x 137) cal, and personal significance. Novels
of men peering through bamboo Mitsui Bunko, Tokyo such as the early eleventh-century
shades, gaps in hedges, and cracks in Tale ofGenji describe how the arrange-
sliding doors. Through the depiction • Screens on the poetic theme "whose ment of the multiple layers of a
of penetrable barriers a voyeuristic sleeves?" (tagasode), showing colorful woman's court dress could convey
aesthetic is suggested, and the erotic garments draped nonchalantly over her aesthetic sophistication, color
innuendo intensified. JTC racks, their wearers nowhere to be sense, and even amorous potential
seen, became extremely popular dur- (more so than her face, which might
ing the Momoyama period and were have remained hidden by a curtain
produced in great numbers through
the late seventeenth century. The or screen). Lovers exchanged waka,
beauty of courtesans, the playful dal- thirty-one syllable court poems, on
the
topic of "whose sleeves?" which
liance of men and women, and erotic connoted an erotic encounter or
sentiments are subtly suggested by
omission in such paintings.