Utagawa Toyokuni II (1777-1835) Japanese, Color Woodblock Print. Depicts a scene on a terrace overlooking a vast plain, with two women huddled together at right, a samurai with two swords and a hawk perched on the top one in the middle, and a frightening little person crouched next to him, all of them looking at something to the left of the frame. Signed in kanji lower right. 

Overall: 19 1/2 x 14 1/2 in.

Sight: 15 1/2 x 9 1/2 in.

#3125 . 

Utagawa Toyokuni II, first known as Toyoshige, was born in 1777. Little has been discovered about his birthplace or early years, and it appears he first entered the studio of Utagawa Toyokuni in 1818 at a very late age. This was not exactly unusual, but latecomers to art were primarily aged samurai seeking a new line of work, and no known work of Toyoshige exists before this time, suggesting this was his motivation as well. His earliest known work is a fan print from 1823, with actor prints following the next year. He became a designer of ukiyo-e Japanese woodblock prints in Edo, and his work impressed his master so much that he was officially adopted by him in 1825, the same year Toyokuni I died. From that point on Toyoshige signed his name as Toyokuni and took over as teacher, and his most famous students included Utagawa Kunimatsu, Utagawa Kunishige II, Utagawa Kuniteru III, and Utagawa Kunitsuru I.  When he died in 1835 the family of his master persuaded Kunisada, the most famous student of Toyokuni I, to take up the mantle “Toyokuni” and become leader of the school. Kunisada was apparently very disparaging of Toyoshige, and never officially recognized Toyoshige’s right to the name. Nevertheless, to avoid confusion with patrons and past work, after 1844 Kunisada was always referred to as Toyokuni III. Some historians have speculated that the significant dearth of Toyokuni II’s work, despite being an acknowledged master in his lifetime, may be due to Toyokuni III claiming them himself, or possibly even being somehow responsible for their destruction. Part of the difficulty in identification has arisen because of their shared signature, so similar that it is hard to discern precisely whose work is whose. As much as a headache this could be for future art historians, special attention has been paid to the way that Toyokuni II signed his first kanji, Toyo, with a distinctive zig-zag shape that clearly differentiates it from I and III.