Untitled

Yoshitoyo employs a combination of ink outlines and colour washes, with the tiger’s coat built up from countless tiny dots and fine lines—a technique known as bokashi that creates a textured, almost three‑dimensional effect. The rooster’s feathers are painted in bold, saturated hues, while the background uses flat areas of red and muted bamboo patterns, highlighting the figure‑ground relationship typical of ukiyo‑e prints.

The print dates from the seventh year of an unspecified era, placing it within the late eighteenth‑century Edo period. It entered the Metropolitan Museum of Art through acquisition, though the exact path of ownership prior to the museum’s purchase is not documented in the available records.

During the Edo period, woodblock prints often depicted scenes from folklore, wildlife, and everyday life, serving both decorative and didactic purposes. Yoshitoyo, a prolific artist of the Ichiryūsai school, frequently explored animal subjects, employing meticulous detail to convey both realism and symbolic resonance within a compact pictorial format.