Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) | Yoshitsune's Horse-washing Falls at Yoshino in Yamato Province (Washu Yoshino Yoshitsune uma arai no taki) | Edo period, 19th century

拍品描述

PROPERTY FROM AN ENGLISH PRIVATE COLLECTION woodblock print, from the series A Tour of Waterfalls in Various Provinces (Shokoku taki meguri), signed Saki no Hokusai Iitsu hitsu (Brush of Iitsu, the former Hokusai), censor’s seal kiwame (approved), published by Nishimuraya Yohachi (Eijudo), circa 1832 Vertical oban: 38.3 x 25.9 cm, 15 by 10⅛ in. Two men wash a horse beneath the rushing cascade of a small waterfall in Yoshino, Yamato Province. The flowing water traces an S-curve from the top to the bottom of the composition, a device Hokusai employed frequently in both his paintings and prints. Berlin blue (Bero-ai) is used for the waterfall and a paler blue for the encroaching mist at the right. A delicate grey perhaps suggests the open sky above. The scene evokes an episode from the heroic but tragic life of the warrior Minamoto no Yoshitsune (1159–1189), who was forced to flee from his elder brother Minamoto no Yoritomo ( 1147-1199) after being accused of treachery for forming an alliance with the retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa (1127-1192). According to legend, Yoshitsune stopped at Yoshino during his escape to rest and wash his favourite horse beneath a waterfall. There is no direct evidence for this event, though several Yoshino gazetteers from the early nineteenth century – some eight hundred years after the fact – contain related accounts, suggesting that by this period a body of legend had grown up around Yoshitsune's journey to Yoshino on horseback.¹ A similar impression of the same print is in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, accession number 11.25224, go to: https://collections.mfa.org/objects/216525 1. Timothy Clark ed., Hokusai: Beyond the Great Wave (London, 2017), p. 147.

图片