About This Print and the Folio
One of six chuban size (8 3/4 x 10 3/4 in.) prints issued as part of a portfolio of six prints titled Japanese Life and Customs by the publisher Kyoto Hangain. The portfolio was likely first issued in the early 1950s and the designs are replications of pre-WWII designs from the series Occupations of the Shōwa Era in Pictures (Shōwa shokugyō e-zukishi). As the prints are a smaller format than the original releases, new blocks would have been used.
As shown below, the portfolio carries the English title Japanese Life and Customs, but references the original series Occupations of Shōwa Japan in Pictures beneath it in Japanese (昭和職業絵盡) .
This print pictures two itinerant monks playing the shakuhachi – a bamboo flute and begging for alms. To see the earlier and larger oban size print, please go to Komusō from the series Occupations of Showa Japan in Pictures, Series 1.
click on image to enlarge
和田三造作 [a work by Sanzō Wada]
昭和職業絵盡 [Occupations of Shōwa Japan in Pictures]
三造 [Sanzō followed by 2 small rectangular seals in red]
中判 ["chuban" within gourd-shaped seal]
手摺木版画 六枝組 [handmade woodblock print, set of six]
版元 京都版画院 [publisher Kyoto Hanga In]
Print Details
| IHL Catalog | #1129 |
| Title/Description | Komusō |
| Series | Japanese Life and Customs - A Set of Six Pictures |
| Artist | Wada Sanzō (1883-1967) |
| Signature | not signed |
| Seal | not sealed |
| Publication Date | c. 1950s |
| Publisher | Kyoto Hangain 京都版画院 |
| Printer | |
| Impression | excellent |
| Colors | excellent |
| Condition | excellent |
| Genre | shin hanga |
| Miscellaneous | |
| Format | chuban |
| H x W Paper | 9 1/8 x 11 in. (23.2 x 27.9 cm) |
| H x W Image | 7 15/16 x 9 7/8 in. (20.2 x 25.1 cm) |
| Collections This Print | |
| Reference Literature | |
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