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an image of a drawing of a woman sitting on a blanket next to a birdan image of a drawing of two women standing in front of a firean old drawing of two roosters fighting over each otheran image of a drawing of a group of people in a rooman ink drawing of a woman and two children in front of a pine treean image of a drawing of two men fighting over a body of wateran image of a drawing of a bird flying over a mountainan image of a drawing of a group of people riding horsesan old drawing of a man and a woman in front of a housea drawing of two women sitting on the ground next to each otheran image of a drawing of a group of people in a rooman image of a drawing of a bird flying over a person sitting on a bedan image of a drawing of a woman laying on a bed next to another womanan image of a drawing of a man on a horse pulling a cartdrawing of two men on horseback in the sky with clouds behind theman image of a drawing of two women sitting on the flooran old drawing of a group of people in a gardenan ink drawing of a man and a woman in a landscapean image of a drawing of a man riding a horse next to a treean old drawing of two women in a field with a fence in the foreground
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84 - HOKUSAI (1760–1849)
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Estimate €15,000 - €20,000
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Description
HOKUSAI (1760–1849) HIDA NO TAKUMI MONOGATARI ‘The Tale of a Craftsman from Hida’. A set of twenty shita-e illustrations for the six-volume work, published in 1809. The drawings are preserved, folded in half, between two reddish-brown cardboard covers with embossed sayakata motifs. Each sketch bears a small oval collector’s stamp in the lower right-hand corner inscribed ‘Ch. Martyne’. (Some foxing). DIM. (drawings) 18.7 × 26.6 cm (7 3/8 × 10 1/2 in.) – DIM. (folded) 18.8 × 13.5 cm (7 3/8 × 5 5/16 in.) This famous tale, which is as much an adventure novel as it is a fairy tale and a love story, was written by Rokujuen (Ishikawa Masamochi – 1753–1830), a poet and writer of the late Edo period. It tells the story of Inabe no Suminawa, a brilliant carpenter from Hida, whose works are so perfect that they seem to come to life. The sages of the Buddhist Paradise task him with rescuing the souls of two young Sennin (Immortals), Yamabito and Nyoichi, who have strayed into the human world. On this quest, the craftsman must draw upon all his skill to battle malevolent spirits and aid those in need. He will meet, in particular, Masumitsu—initially a rival but later a companion—who will accompany him throughout the story; Murasaki, daughter of Funanushi and Yamabito’s lover; as well as several other characters, some more benevolent than others. These twenty shita-e, out of the thirty-five illustrations featured in the novel, are particularly interesting in that they give us a glimpse of the number of intermediate stages that could sometimes exist between the ichiji-shita-e and the hanshita-e. These sketches do indeed appear to be rough compositional drafts, with just a few characters – not all of them – positioned where they should be, mostly without any background or embellishment. If we take the example of ‘The Preparation of the Elixir by the Two Sennin’ (pl. 2) and compare this drawing with that in lot 80, as well as with the one held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (see their website ‘Album of Sketches by Katsushika Hokusai and His Disciples’ – the one containing 109 sketches), we are presented with three different stages of the illustration, with the Metropolitan Museum’s version falling between that of our series and that of lot 80, which is the most fully developed. The drawing of the two roosters, a copy of which is in the same album at the Metropolitan Museum, however, represents an earlier stage than that in the collection. Although most of the drawings are of such high quality that one can only attribute them to Hokusai, it is not impossible that his pupils may have contributed to the creation of some of them. About the collector: Charles Martyne (1876–1936) was a librarian at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. A bibliophile and watercolourist, he was a great connoisseur of drawings and prints. He built up a very extensive collection of master drawings, books and graphic works. An auction of his collection took place in May 1939. The estate of his nephew and heir, Jean-Louis Debauve, was, for its part, sold in December 2017. Bibliographical note: This novel has been translated into French and published with all of Hokusai’s illustrations, under the title: *Suminawa, the Carpenter of the Gods*, by Ishikawa Masamochi, introduced by Jean-Sébastien Cluzel, Nouvelles Editions Scala, 2023.
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About the sale THE BERNARD ROUSSEAU COLLECTION – DRAWINGS BY HOKUSAI, PAINTINGS FROM JAPAN AND CHINA
Auction location
Auction time 10/22/2026 at 3:30 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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