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The Tale of Genji: The Paulownia Court (Genji Kiritsubo), no. 1 from the series Genji in Fifty-Four Sheets (Genji gojûyonmai no uchi)


「げんじ五十四まいのうち 第一番 げんじ桐壺」
Nishimura Shigenaga (Japanese, 1697?–1756)
Publisher: Izumiya Gonshirô (Japanese)
Japanese
Edo period
about 1735 (Kyôhô 20)

Medium/Technique Woodblock print (beni-e); ink on paper, with hand-applied and stenciled color and metallic powder
Dimensions Horizontal hosoban; 16.3 x 34 cm (6 7/16 x 13 3/8 in.)
Credit Line William Sturgis Bigelow Collection
Accession Number11.19127
NOT ON VIEW
ClassificationsPrints

Catalogue Raisonné Waterhouse, Images of Eighteenth-Century Japan (1975), #40 (described but not illustrated); the series: Marks et al., Genji's World (2012), list #G546 (no photos)
Signed Yamato gakô Nishimura Shigenaga hitsu
大和画工 西村重長筆
Marks Artist's seal: Shige
InscriptionsPoem: Itoki naki/ hatsumotoyui ni/ nagaki yo o/ chigiru kokoro wa/ musubikometsu ya
ProvenanceBy 1911, purchased by William Sturgis Bigelow (b. 1850 - d. 1926), Boston [see note 1]; 1911, gift of Bigelow to the MFA. (Accession Date: August 3, 1911)

NOTES:
[1] Much of Bigelow's collection of Asian art was formed during his residence in Japan between 1882 and 1889, although he also made acquisitions in Europe and the United States. Bigelow deposited many of these objects at the MFA in 1890 before donating them to the Museum's collection at later dates.