About This Print

Source: Kiyochika: Artist of Meiji Japan, Henry D. Smith II, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, 1988, p. 60-61.
One of twenty-five prints created by Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915), each showing four faces in caricature.  The first eight prints were issued in 1882  and published by Hara Taneaki under the series title Thirty-Two Faces, New Edition.  The series was so popular that it led to a second series in early 1883 titled One Hundred Faces: Supplement to Thirty-Two Faces (Sanjūni sō tsuika hyakumensō), some of which were published by Hara, the remainder by Morimoto Junzaburō.

"[T]he theme of "one hundred faces" (hyakumensō) came originally from a vaudeville act of the late Edo period in which a performer imitated emotional states and social types by rapidly changing facial expression with various props."  Kiyochika's prints were so popular that they "led to a staging of the series by the kabuki actor Ichikawa Danjurō IX at the Shintomiza Theater on April 23, 1883..."

Inscriptions

Source: Kanji from website of Institut für Ostasienwissenschaften der Universität Wien http://kenkyuu.jpn.univie.ac.at/karikaturen/detail.asp?docid=959&lang=j&first=1; English translations by me and are not confirmed.

床屋に髭をそるため鼻をもちあげられて上唇を伸ばす男 The man whose upper lip is being stretched while having his mustache shaved at the barbershop
結いあげた髪の根元を鏡でみて不満そうな女 a woman looks in the mirror and is dissatisfied with her hair
手をたたいて嬉しそうに笑う幼児 a child claps his hands and laughs joyfully
涙をこぼしながら口をあけてなく男の子 a boy opens his mouth and spills tears

Print Details

IHL Catalog	#554
Title or Description	Mustache shaving (higesori 髭すり); opposite mirrors (awasekagami 合せ鏡); laughing child (waratteiru ko 笑ってゐる児); crying child (naiteiru ko みんながあすばしてくれない) [English translation of kanji in upper right hand corner of each face is unconfirmed; kanji from Keio University Digital Gallery of Rare Books & Special Collections http://project.lib.keio.ac.jp/dg_kul/ukiyoe_artist_title.php?id=018]
Series	One Hundred Faces: Supplement to Thirty-Two Faces  [also translated as A New Series of Thirty-Two Physiognomies]  Sanjūni sō tsuika hyakumensō 三十二相追加 百面相
Artist	Kiyochika Kobayashi (1847-1915)
Signature
Seal	none
Publication Date	March 1883 明治十六年三月 (see below)
Publisher	Morimoto Junzaburō 森本順三郎 top: date as shown above center: 画工 小林清親 artist: Kobayashi Kiyochika preceded by address 芝区源助丁十二番ﾁ Shiba-ku Gensuke-chō 12-banchi bottom: 板元 森本順三郎 publisher: Morimoto Junzaburō preceded by address 浅草区瓦町二番地 Asakusa Kawaramachi 2-banchi [Marks: pub. ref. 349; seal ref. 26-088]
Impression	excellent
Colors	excellent
Condition	good - minor soiling, slightly trimmed; two small tears in upper right and lower right corners repaired from back; not backed
Genre	ukiyo-e; fūshiga, giga
Miscellaneous
Format	oban
H x W Paper	14 x 9 5/8 in. (35.6 x 24.4 cm)
Literature
Collections This Print	Keio University Digital Gallery of Rare Books & Special Collections Ukiyo-e Collection; Smithsonian Institution Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery S2003.8.1375.11

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