277 - UTAGAWA KUNIYOSHI: SOMEONE WHO MAKES A FOOL OF PEOPLE

UTAGAWA KUNIYOSHI: SOMEONE WHO MAKES A FOOL OF PEOPLE By Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861), signed Ichiyusai Kuniyoshi ga with kiri seal Japan, c. 1847 Color woodblock print on paper. Vertical oban. Signed Ichiyusai Kuniyoshi ga with kiri seal; publisher: Yamatoya Kyubei, sealed to the lower left. Title Hito o baka ni shita hito da (Someone Who Makes a Fool of People), from the series Menso Giga (A Figures' Face). Finely printed as a humorous yose-e (composite picture), the oversized head ingeniously assembled from intertwined nude figures. SIZE of the sheet 36 x 25.2 cm Condition: Good condition, with minor wear, slight fading to colors, and light browning to paper. Minor soiling, expected rubbing. A small paper reinforcement to the back on the upper right margin. This remarkable print belongs to Kuniyoshi’s celebrated yose-e, or composite pictures, in which numerous individual figures are combined to create a larger image. The conceit forms part of the playful world of giga, comic imagery devoted to caricature, exaggeration, and visual wit. Although the composition abounds with nudity, its purpose is humorous rather than erotic: the viewer is invited to decipher how the apparently grotesque face has been constructed. Kuniyoshi pushes the illusion to extraordinary lengths. Intertwined bodies swell into cheeks, noses, and lips, while the blue checked garment itself is assembled from further clothed figures. Even the smallest details participate in the joke: the eye is formed by a black bowl, the eyebrow by a black fundoshi, and the beard by a tattoo. The resulting face seems coherent at first glance, yet dissolves into a mass of separate bodies as soon as the eye begins to examine it more closely. The humor lies precisely in this instability. Kuniyoshi turns looking itself into a game: the viewer repeatedly shifts between recognizing a single human head and discovering the multitude of figures hidden within it. The print therefore demonstrates not only his gift for caricature but also his fascination with optical illusion and pictorial transformation, qualities that make his comic designs among the most inventive images of late Edo-period ukiyo-e. Such comic exaggeration has deeper roots in Japanese art. Medieval satire such as Choju-jinbutsu-giga (Scrolls of Frolicking Animals and Humans) already cultivated expressive distortion through elastic gesture and mischievous humor. By the Edo period this sensibility entered popular prints and illustrated books, where artists refined pictorial puzzle and caricature for urban audiences. Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861) was one of the last great masters of ukiyo-e. His work spanned a wide range of subjects: landscapes, bijin (beautiful women), Kabuki actors, cats, mythical creatures, and heroic samurai battles. His prints are represented in major museum collections worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Princeton University Art Museum, Walters Art Museum, Portland Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Brooklyn Museum, and the Van Gogh Museum. Kuniyoshi’s fascination with visual invention appears across his work. Known for dramatic warrior triptychs, he also explored whimsical imagery. Figures assembled from cats, bodies formed from smaller elements, and concealed pictures within compositions reveal sustained interest in optical illusion. In the present work that impulse condenses into a single grotesque head. Museum comparison: Compare a closely related print in the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, accession number 1981.1.54. Auction comparison: Compare a related print by the same artist, from the same series, at Bonhams, Japanese Art, 28 May-10 June 2024, London, lot 1022 (sold for GBP 19,200 or approx. EUR 24,000 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing).