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Stockno.:19-165
Artist:Katsushika Hokusai 葛飾北斎(1769-1849)
Description: Emperor Tenji also known as Tenchi (Tenji Tenno 天智天), from the series One Hundred Poems by One Hundred Poets explained by the Nurse (Hyakunin isshu uba ga etoki 百人一首姥がゑとき). Published by Nishimuraya Yohachi (Eijudō) in c.1830. *This is the first design from Hokusai's uncompleted series, The Hundred Poems as Told by the Nurse, which was the last major single sheet series Hokusai designed before he devoted his remaining years primarily to painting commissions. Of the intended series of one hundred, only twenty-seven prints are known to have been completed; an additional sixty-four designs survive in the form of preparatory drawings. Hokusai based this series on the well-known anthology of poems, the Hyakunin Isshu (A Hundred Poems by a Hundred Poets), compiled by the poet Fujiwara no Teika in 1235. The collected verses were (and continue to be) familiar to most Japanese. Hokusai approaches the poems from the perspective of an uneducated wet-nurse.