Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

Ashmolean − Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

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Komachi Washing Her Book of Poems

Glossary (4)

mitate, mitate-e, nishiki-e, vegetable pigments

  • mitate

    Mitate, or riddle, is a form of visual and literary parody on a classical theme. It required prior knowledge in order to decipher it.

  • mitate-e

    Mitate-e, or riddle, is a form of visual and literary parody on a classical theme. It required prior knowledge in order to decipher it.

  • nishiki-e

    Nishiki-e literally means 'brocade pictures' and refers to multi-coloured woodblock prints.

  • vegetable pigments

    Vegetable pigments were used to create coloured dyes for Japanese prints, paintings, and textiles. These pigments often faded over time due to the chemical reactions they underwent.

Location

    • currently in research collection

Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.

 

Publications online

  • Beauties of the Four Seasons by Mitsuko Watanabe

    Beauties of the Four Seasons

    The Nana-komachi series is a popular topic used by various ukiyo-e artists in a form of mitate. It is based on the seven stories about the celebrated poet Ono no Komachi of the Heian period (794-1192), who was known for her outstanding beauty.

    Here a woman, as a mitate of Sōshiarai-Komachi, is reading a book. She wears a kimono with a cherry blossom similar to that of Sōshiarai-Komachi who is in the background in a cartouche, in which she kneels by a bowl, washing away the poem from the sōshi (poem book) to prove that it was her own work and not from an earlier time. Ono no Komachi’s name of Sōshiarai derives from this story.

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