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Kaigetsudo Ando
Early 1700s
| Painter. He founded the Kaigetsudo school of ukiyoe painters and print designers. A specialist in nikuhitsuga (‘original paintings’; polychrome paintings), he never designed woodblock prints. He took his artist’s name from the studio (eya) he managed in the Suwacho district of Edo. His work shows the influence of the earlier ukiyoe artists, HISHIKAWA MORONOBU and Sugimura Jihei ( flc. 1681–1703). He specialized in nikuhitsu bijinga (‘original pictures of beautiful women’; see JAPAN, fig. 167), which set the standard of feminine beauty in ukiyoe at the beginning of the 18th century. Ando’s tall, elegant and somewhat haughty bijin typify the dignity of the high-class courtesans of the Yoshiwara quarter (located 2 km north of Ando’s studio). They are dressed in luxurious kimonos, which he executed with a characteristically dark palette and a rough brushline. His representative works include Courtesan and Attendant (‘Yujo ni kamaro’, colours on paper, 930*503 mm; Tokyo, N. Mus.) and Scroll of Customs and Manners (‘Fuzoku zukan’; Boston, MA, Mus. F.A.). Ando was exiled to Izu (now Kanagawa Prefect.) for his part in the Ejima scandal in 1714, but he is thought to have resumed his artistic career when he returned to Edo in 1733. |
