![]() Sackler Gallery, “Inventing Utamaro: A Japanese Masterpiece Rediscovered,” reunites three large-scale paintings by Utamaro that were always meant to be seen together. No matter that the graceful courtesans depicted with swooping necks, immaculate upswept hair, and beautifully draped kimonos were what we would call in contemporary parlance “sex workers.” At the time, the precision and harmony of these paintings’ style, as well as the romantic, glossy presentation of the subject matter, exerted a mighty pull on a Western world seeking escape from a period of often-frightening change.Ī new exhibition at the Smithsonian's Arthur M. These works were particularly appealing to a rapidly industrializing West that was becoming obsessed with the East, a world seen as exotic and alluring. Kitagawa Utamaro (1753-1806), the mystery man, was considered one of the foremost practitioners of ukiyo-e, paintings that portray a “floating world” of pleasure. Art-world sleuths have no idea where the painting was during the intervening years. ![]() Then, more than a hundred years on, the missing work resurfaced. A century later, one of three unusually large scroll paintings in a triptych that was one of his masterworks disappeared. A mystery-man artist in 18th-century Japan created scenes of pleasure in the ukiyo-e genre.
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