Ito Shinsui (Japan, 1898-1972) Print, dai oban tate-e, from the series Gendai bijinshū dai-isshu (現代美人集第一輯), First collection of modern beauties, plate Gifu chōchin (岐阜提灯), Paper lantern in the Gifu style. Signed Shinsui and stamped Shinsui. Publisher Watanabe Shōzaburō and seals. Dated in the summer of Showa 5 (1930). On the reverse, numbered 181/250. Size 42.8 x 27.6 cm As a young artist, Shinsui studied under Kiyokata. In 1916, he attracted the attention of Watanabe Shōzaburō and soon published their first collaboration, 'In Front of the Mirror'. From 1922 onwards, Shinsui's work consisted mainly of bijin-ga. This print belongs to Shinsui's series of twenty-one prints, First Collection of Modern Beauties. The artist began this series in 1929 and completed it two years later. As Watanabe Shōzaburō describes it: ''A Collection of Modern Beauties'' began to be distributed to special subscribers from July 1929, and it is limited to only two hundred and fifty copies and will not be reprinted. The 200 copies are distributed to subscribers and the remaining 50 copies are sold to those who wish. As Mr Itō has been very busy of late with painting commissions, the publication of his colour prints is likely to be delayed." The woman in this print is hanging a lantern. This type of lantern was set up during the autumn and was nicknamed the Gifu lantern after the town where it was produced. The lantern held by the young woman is decorated with autumnal grasses and flowers: Belles-de-jour and pampas grasses. The upper and lower parts of the lantern are lacquered with chrysanthemums. The first lanterns of this type were developed at the end of the 19th century by a man called Ozeki. He developed a more efficient system in which a single bamboo stick is wrapped around the support on which the paper is hung. The Toledo catalogue of 1936 explains that this print was made from ten blocks of wood and twenty to thirty superimposed impressions.