The Floating World

A collection

Beauties & Actors

The floating world was above all a world of people — the celebrated beauties of the teahouses and the kabuki actors whose faces sold in the thousands. Kitagawa Utamaro drew women with a psychological closeness no one had attempted, and in ten astonishing months of 1794–95 the mysterious Tōshūsai Sharaku cut actor portraits so unsparing they ended his career. Both were published by Tsutaya Jūzaburō, the greatest publisher of the age, who printed Sharaku’s portraits on grounds of glittering mica. These are the faces that made the medium famous.

Woman Reading a Letter — Kitagawa UtamaroTen Types in the Physiognomic Study of Women (Fujin sōgaku juttai)Woman Reading a LetterKitagawa Utamaro · c. 1792–93Takashima Ohisa — Kitagawa UtamaroKitagawa UtamaroTakashima OhisaKitagawa Utamaro · c. 1793Naniwaya Okita — Kitagawa UtamaroKitagawa UtamaroNaniwaya OkitaKitagawa Utamaro · c. 1793Ōtani Oniji III as the Yakko Edobei — Tōshūsai SharakuTōshūsai SharakuŌtani Oniji III as the Yakko EdobeiTōshūsai Sharaku · 1794 (Kansei 6, 5th month)Ichikawa Ebizō as Takemura Sadanoshin — Tōshūsai SharakuTōshūsai SharakuIchikawa Ebizō as Takemura SadanoshinTōshūsai Sharaku · 1794 (Kansei 6, 5th month)Segawa Tomisaburō II as Yadorigi — Tōshūsai SharakuTōshūsai SharakuSegawa Tomisaburō II as YadorigiTōshūsai Sharaku · 1794 (Kansei 6, 5th month)Matsumoto Kōshirō IV as the Fish Seller Gorobei — Tōshūsai SharakuTōshūsai SharakuMatsumoto Kōshirō IV as the Fish Seller GorobeiTōshūsai Sharaku · 1794 (Kansei 6, 5th month)Sakata Hangorō III as Fujikawa Mizuemon — Tōshūsai SharakuTōshūsai SharakuSakata Hangorō III as Fujikawa MizuemonTōshūsai Sharaku · 1794 (Kansei 6, 5th month)