Gardens and Pavilions of Pleasure
Original Language Title遊郭図
Artist
Hishikawa Moronobu
(Japanese, ca. 1618 - 1694)
CultureJapanese
Datelate 17th century
MediumSix-panel screen; ink and colors on paper
DimensionsOverall: 30 3/4 × 90 3/4 inches (78.11 × 230.51 cm)
Credit LinePurchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust
Object number32-83/16
On View
On viewGallery Location
- 205
Collections
Exhibition HistoryOrigins: Collecting to Create the Nelson-Atkins, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, August 14, 2021-March 6, 2022.
Hokusai: Masterpieces from the Spencer Museum of Art, Richardson-North Collection, and The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, September 21, 2024 - February 1, 2025.
Lasting Impressions: The Art of Japanese Woodblock Prints, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, April 5, 2025–July 6, 2025, no cat.
Located in a suburb of Edo (present-day Tokyo),
the world of New Yoshiwara brothels was
glamorized in pictorial art during the Edo period
(1615–1868). New Yoshiwara was a cultural hub
for wealthy sophisticates who enjoyed artistic
pursuits. They started cultural trends that crept
into Edo’s popular culture.
Hishikawa Moronobu, a pioneer artist in the rise of
ukiyo-e in the 1600s, portrayed fashionably dressed
men and women engaging in different activities.
These idealized figures created an illusion of New
Yoshiwara as a beautiful, sophisticated, and serene
place, while real working conditions there were
harsh and not as harmonious as this painting shows.
With K. Matsuki, Kamakura, Japan, by 1932;
Purchased from Matsuki, through Langdon Warner, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1932.
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