Item from the Mokuhankan Flea Market

Cone-headed Grasshopper and Praying Mantis

Size: 26.5cm by 38.0cm (10.43 in by 14.96 in) | Enlargement | Shipping Code: [L] ?

Designer: Kitagawa Utamaro

Era: Early Showa | Currency: $ / £ / €

Price: ¥ 12,000$ 96.00£ 70.00€ 82.00 [Item has been sold]

Description: The print is from Utamaro's series Pictures of Insects (Ehon Mushi Erami); a collection of 15 designs of insects and other garden creatures that pairs various insects with humorous or suggestive poems (kyoka) reflecting on human behavior. The poems were written by Ishikawa Masamochi.

In this scene a praying mantis is posed atop a gourd while a cone-headed grasshopper is going the opposite direction along the body of a green bean vain.

The accompanying kyoka on the left reads:

While I wait for you at midnight, I hear the cry of a grasshopper and think it is the sound of the creaking door.

Not knowing if my love will have a change of mind, I wait holding my head high like a praying mantis.

This verse playfully uses the insects as metaphors for themes of hope, uncertainty and longing.

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