Nishimura Shigenaga (1697-1756) | Chapter Twenty-four, Butterflies (Kocho) | Edo period, 18th century

Gerhard Pulverer (b. 1930)

Doitsu Puruvera korekushon ukiyo-e hanga meihinten [Masterpieces of Ukiyo-e from the Pulverer Collection], exhibited at the following venues: 

Matsuzakaya Department Store, Osaka, 27^th December 1990 - 8^th January 1991

Matsuzakaya Department Store, Ginza, 24^th - 29^th January 1991

Narazaki Muneshige, ed., Hizo ukiyo-e taikan, Puruvera korekushon [Ukiyo-e Masterpieces in Western Collections: The Pulverer Collection] (Tokyo, 1990), no. 9.

Doitsu Puruvera korekushon ukiyo-e hanga meihinten [Masterpieces of Ukiyo-e from the Pulverer Collection] (Tokyo, 1990), p. 25, no. 1-15.

Genji in Fifty-Four Sheets was conceived as a series of woodblock prints illustrating each chapter of the classic novel written by Lady Murasaki Shikibu during the Heian period. Each reniform (suhama), or folding fan-shaped, scene was named with a chapter title and corresponding Genji crest. The set was a collaborative work by Nishimura Shigenaga and Torii Kiyomasa II: Shigenaga designed the first twenty-six prints, Kiyomasu the remaining twenty-eight. Only twenty-three of the designs are known. 

Other prints by Shigenaga in the series with suhama-form cartouches are in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, accession numbers 11.19133, 11.19140 and 11.19141.