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Women Washing and Drying Lengths of Cloth in a Garden beside the Sumida River
Women Washing and Drying Lengths of Cloth in a Garden beside the Sumida River

Women Washing and Drying Lengths of Cloth in a Garden beside the Sumida River

Artist/Maker (Japanese, 1752–1815)
Publisher
Date1788
MediumColor woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper
DimensionsVertical ōban triptych
Overall (left): 15 3/16 × 9 15/16 in. (38.5 × 25.3 cm)
Overall (center): 15 1/16 × 10 1/4 in. (38.3 × 26 cm)
Overall (right): 15 1/8 × 9 3/4 in. (38.4 × 24.8 cm)
Credit LineMary A. Ainsworth Bequest
Object number1950.376
Status
Not on view
More Information
This triptych (three sheet print) shows women washing and drying clothes, fixing their hair, smoking a pipe, and otherwise relaxing in a private garden setting. A departure from more formal bijinga subjects, these domestic scenes gained great popularity in the last decades of the 18th century.

The triptych format provided the designer with a large space to create complex and detailed scenes like this one, but it also had an economic incentive for the publisher: it required the buyer to purchase three prints instead of only one.
Exhibition History
Summer Asia Institute Exhibition
  • Kresge Art Center, Michigan State University (June 24, 1959 - July 30, 1959 )
A College Collects: Japanese Prints from Oberlin College
  • Allentown Art Museum, Allentown, PA (September 25, 1960 - October 15, 1960 )
  • Hollins College, Hollins, VA (November 5, 1960 - November 25, 1960 )
  • Public Library of Winston-Salem, Winston-Salem, NC (December 9, 1960 - December 29, 1960 )
  • Watkins Institute, Nashville, TN (January 12, 1961 - February 2, 1961 )
  • Port Arthur Service League, Port Arthur, TX (March 20, 1961 - April 10, 1961 )
  • University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT (April 23, 1961 - May 15, 1961 )
  • Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA (October 6, 1961 - October 26, 1961 )
  • Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI (November 8, 1961 - November 29, 1961 )
  • State University of New York, Oswego, NY (January 14, 1962 - February 4, 1962 )
  • Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, British Columbia, Canada (March 23, 1962 - April 13, 1962 )
  • Wichita Art Museum, Wichitia, KS (September 6, 1962 - September 26, 1962 )
  • Tuskegee Institute, Tuskegee, AL (October 16, 1962 - November 6, 1962 )
  • University of Rochester, Rochester, NY (November 20, 1962 - December 11, 1962 )
A Life in Prints: Mary A. Ainsworth and the Floating World
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (February 3, 2015 - June 7, 2015 )
Ukiyo-e Prints from the Mary Ainsworth Collection
  • Chiba City Museum of Art, Chiba, Japan (April 13, 2019 - May 25, 2019 )
  • Shizuoka City Museum of Art, Shizuoka, Japan (June 8, 2019 - July 28, 2019 )
  • Osaka City Museum of Fine Arts, Osaka, Japan (August 10, 2019 - September 29, 2019 )
Collections
  • Asian
This record was created from historic documentation and may not have been reviewed by a curator. Noticed a mistake? Have some extra information about this object? Please contact us.