Uur van het schaap: Toekomst voorspellen 1793 - 1797

Curator: Kitagawa Utamaro created this intriguing print, sometime between 1793 and 1797, entitled *Uur van het schaap: Toekomst voorspellen*. It currently resides in the Rijksmuseum. I find the mood it evokes very dreamlike. Editor: Dreamlike, yes, and rather still, as if these figures have been captured at a precise moment. There’s a distinct textural quality here. Can you tell me more about the medium? Curator: It is an ukiyo-e print, so it would have been a woodblock print. Given the period and artist, this piece points to a fascinating period of popular entertainment culture, a form of ephemeral consumer product that nonetheless tells a profound story. See the hour of the Sheep invoked in the title. The women, their actions, even their placement hint at the act of foretelling. Editor: I find it fascinating to think about the making. The skill that goes into carving the blocks for these subtle color variations must have been immense! How the materials and their production would affect the image culturally and economically is what I consider. Curator: It reflects not only the aesthetics of its era but also prevailing spiritual and emotional states. In the expressions and gestures, we can infer aspirations, perhaps even anxieties, about the future. And let's not dismiss that vase. It symbolizes domestic space, the potential fertility within that space and how it is subject to fate. Editor: Agreed! Those subtle indications require tremendous craftsmanship. And that brings me back to labor, to workshops... I’d be curious to know more about the hands that brought this into being and the broader networks of consumption. Curator: When viewing artwork, I feel as if it is never just an aesthetic object. It encapsulates layers of meaning that shape and reveal cultural consciousness. Editor: True. It makes me appreciate just how many material components came together through complex human and social production.