(Courtesan and kamuro wearing kimono with giant carp), Utagawa Kunisada

Archive Label 2003:
One of the spectacles of the Yoshiwara pleasure quarters was the procession of courtesans along the Nakanocho, or main boulevard, dressed in their finery and accompanied by their attendants. It was a favorite subject of ukiyoe artists. By the early nineteenth century, however, the number of courtesans had declined and they could no longer afford elaborate parades. Depictions of these events, generally in the form of triptychs and pentaptychs (three and five-panel continuous image sets), had also become stereotyped. The print shown here is thought to be the right-most panel of a triptych.

In this print, Kunisada depicts a courtesan promenading beneath a cherry tree in a Boy’s Day parade, accompanied by a single little kamuro attendant. The courtesan is wearing a profusion of tortoiseshell hairpins, a robe sumptuously decorated with dazzling patterns and a design of giant carp, and high, black-lacquered geta, or wooden slippers, that were all hallmarks of her trade. The courtesan and her attendant wear robes of identical design, depicting the carp that is one of the traditional symbols of the Boy’s Day Festival.

Courtesans’ fashions of the late-Edo period grew increasingly extravagant as the years progressed. Carefully-rendered textiles demonstrate how ukiyoe artists used color to make vivid the luxury, elegance, and refinements of the world of pleasure.