Torii Kotondo (1900-1977) | Rain (Ame) | Showa period, 20th century
Lot Closed
November 18, 02:55 PM GMT
Estimate
3,000 - 4,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
Torii Kotondo (1900-1977)
Rain (Ame)
Showa period, 20th century
woodblock print, signed Kotondo ga (Pictured by Kotondo), sealed Kotondo, embossed title to the bottom margin Ame, publisher's mark embossed to the lower left corner Sakai Kawaguchi go ban [joint venture, Sakai and Kawaguchi], dated Showa yonen jugatsu (October 1929), limited edition paper label to the reverse inscribed and hand-numbered Gaikoku yuki nihyaku-mai kagiri zeppan dai hyaku sanjukyu go (For foreign export, limited edition of 200, number 139), signed Torii Kotondo and sealed Kotondo
Vertical dai-oban: 41 x 26.4 cm., 16⅛ x 10⅜ in.
Arguably Kotondo’s best known design, an impression of the print was exhibited at the Toleda Exhibition organized by Yoshida Hiroshi (see Lots 25 - 32) in 1930. It depicts a gracefully dressed young woman walking in the rain under the shelter of a waxed paper umbrella. Lawrence Smith comments that:
‘This taste for young women with parasols or umbrellas had been nurtured by the Nihonga painters Uemura Shoen (19875-1949) and Kaburagi Kiyokata (1878-1973). The latter passing it on to his pupils Shunsui and Kotondo himself. The artist uses here a much older Japanese convention in paintings and prints of representing rain by straight lines, but the low, dramatic point of view shows strong Western influence’.1
1. Lawrence Smith, Modern Japanese Prints 1912-1989: Woodblocks and Stencils, (London, 1994), p. 49, no. 41, pl. 40.
For a different impression in the collection of the British Museum, museum number 1981,0801,0.4, go to:
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/A_1981-0801-0-4