Burning the Altar

jhellden:

Body of a courtesan in nine stages of decomposition, c. 1870

When I read Henri Duday’s The Archaeology of the Dead: Lectures in Archaeothanatology (Oxbow Books 2009), I stumbled upon a black and white print of the same motive from the early 19th century Japan entitled “Voyages de la Mort” showing the decomposition of a corpse in 12 vignettes. In Japanese this motive is called kusôzu, lit. ‘images of the nine stages’ - a sort of Japanese Memento Mori.

Since then I have unsuccesfully tried to find these vignettes in a colour version. What I have found instead are these fascinating drawings depicting the same motive:

Description
Paintied handscroll by Kobayashi Eitaku (1843 - 1890).
Ink and colour on silk. Sealed.

Dimensions
Height: 25.5 centimetres
Width: 501.5 centimetres

Curator’s comments
The scroll shows the stages of decomposition of the body of a woman, beginning with her fully clothed body and ending with her bones being eaten by dogs. The subject is an ancient Buddhist one, treating of the transience of the physical body, but which later assumed didactic functions relating to the proper conduct of women. In this example, however, the theme is given a new and somewhat prurient twist by its featuring of a prostitute as the subject. The work intersects with the world of ‘erotic pictures’ (shunga) and gives a very useful counterpoint for studying that genre. A prolific and versatile artist trained in the traditional Kano school, Eitaku achieved success rather through ukiyoe works and newspaper illustrations, but his reputation in Japan is not yet as high as it should be. Like many important artists whose careers straddled the end of the Edo period and beginning of the Meiji era, Japanese scholars have found it problematic to classify him. (TTC, Dec 2008)

Source: britishmuseum.org

More: See further example here or here, with some interesting reflexions by Sara Reads on Kusôzu and the grotesque