Young Man (Wakashu) with a Miniature Flower Cart 1750s - 1760s

Ishikawa Toyonobu created this print of a young man with a miniature flower cart in the eighteenth century. Note the careful arrangement of flowers, mirroring the deliberate cultivation of youth and beauty found in courtesan culture. The Wakashu, an adolescent male, occupies a unique space, embodying both masculine and feminine ideals. He is adorned in patterned robes and carries a katana sword, a symbol of the samurai class. Yet, the delicate flowers soften this militaristic association. In ancient Greece, we see the ephebos, youths celebrated for their beauty and athletic prowess, much like the Wakashu, reflecting a societal fascination with adolescence. This fascination transcends cultures, recurring in Renaissance paintings of androgynous angels and cherubs. Each era imbues these figures with its own desires and anxieties, projecting onto them the ephemeral nature of beauty and the passage of time, revealing our collective yearning to capture and preserve fleeting youth.