Woman Playing with a Young Boy

Hishikawa Sôri (mentioned on object), 1804

Een vrouw met een speelgoed rat in haar hand, speelt met een jongetje. De speelgoed hamer op de vloer verwijst naar de geluksgod Daikoku, die een rat als boodschapper heeft. Prent voor het nieuwe jaar van de rat , 1804. Met twee gedichten.

  • Artwork typeprint, surimono
  • Object numberRP-P-1991-562
  • Dimensionsheight 125 mm x width 167 mm
  • Physical characteristicsnishikie, with metallic pigments

Hishikawa Sôri

Woman Playing with a Young Boy

Japan, Japan, Japan, 1804

Provenance

…; purchased from the dealer Hotei Japanese Prints, Leiden, by J.H.W. Goslings (1943-2011), Epse, near Deventer, 1985;1Coll. cat. Goslings 1999, p. 66, cat. no. 149 by whom donated to the museum, 1991

Object number: RP-P-1991-562

Credit line: Gift of J.H.W. Goslings, Epse


The artist

Biography

Hishikawa Sori, previously Tawaraya Soji, also used the name Hyakurin, was a pupil of Katsushika Hokusai, who received the name Sori (III) in 1798.


Entry

A woman sitting by a standing screen, tsuitate, holds a toy rat while a boy crawls towards her, a toy mallet behind him.

The toy mallet in the design is a reference to Daikoku's Hammer of Chaos, Konton no tsuchi, the usual attribute of this God of Fortune, whose messenger is a rat. That the signature - probably to the right - was trimmed off makes it unlikely that this surimono, clearly in the Hokusai tradition, was also signed by Hokusai.

Two poems by Yabunouchi Nanamori and Hekirotei Hamanari.

The first poem expresses the happy anticipation before the New Year of the Rat when nothing is as it was before.

Issued by the poets
Unsigned


Literature

M. Forrer, Surimono in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Leiden 2013, no. 122


Citation

M. Forrer, 2013, 'Hishikawa Sôri, Woman Playing with a Young Boy, Japan, 1804', in Surimono from the Goslings Collection in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200415816

(accessed 29 November 2025 10:27:20).

Footnotes

  • 1Coll. cat. Goslings 1999, p. 66, cat. no. 149