Design for the songlet -Dream woman- c. 1930

Takehisa Yumeji designed this print, maybe for a songbook, in the early part of the 20th century. The marks here are very economical. It is about as simple as you can get, a few lines and blocks of color, and still suggest the private, subtle act of a woman applying makeup. The flat, pale ground lets the black outline and blocks of purple, blue, and red really pop. It's as though a single brushstroke defines her profile, then a quick dab of red for the lips. The hand holding the cosmetic tool is barely there, a skeletal suggestion of fingers. Yet, somehow, these minimal marks are enough to conjure a whole world of beauty, ritual, and feminine allure. Seeing this, I think of Utamaro, or even Toulouse-Lautrec, artists who also found the power of suggestion and embraced the beauty of the everyday. In art, the less you say, the more people can read into it.