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Metal (Kin): Old Woman Holding a Mirror and Blacking Her Teeth, from the series Five Elements for the Bunsai Poetry Group, a Comparison of Guides to the Pleasure Quarters (Bunsaigawa gogyô, kagai saiken awase)


「文斎側五行金 花街細見合」 鏡
Katsukawa Shun'ei (Japanese, 1762–1819)
Japanese
Edo period
about 1819 (Bunsei 2)

Medium/Technique Woodblock print (surimono); ink and color on paper
Dimensions Shikishiban; 20.4 x 18 cm (8 1/16 x 7 1/16 in.)
Credit Line William Sturgis Bigelow Collection
Accession Number11.25189
NOT ON VIEW
ClassificationsPrints

DescriptionApparently a series by different artists; MFA examples include 11.25189, Metal, by Shun'ei, and 11.25682, Earth, by Kiyomitsu II. Fire, by Hokkei, is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The MMA dates the series to about 1820, but since Shun'ei died in 1819, the date has been adjusted accordingly.
Signed Shun'ei ga
春英画
Marks Blockcutter's mark
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.