Resolution
Jan. 26th, 2026 05:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sonofgodzillaOn Saturday, I went into a print shop to buy a card and ended up with a handful of bookmarks and a lot of questions about a this picture by artist Tsuchiya Kōitsu, initially printed in 1934 and simply entitled Nezu Shrine. I am uneducated, friends, I don't really understand art or art history, and I recognise enough that anywhere that sells "prints" of "famous pictures" is mostly for people searching for souvenirs of time spent away from home or reminders of places they once knew, but I keep thinking about this picture: why is the lady standing alone in the snow? Who is it that is ahead of her? Are they together? Do they know each other? Are they lovers who cannot be seen together or are they simply strangers that arrived at the same time in the dark amidst the virgin snow? The lady is looking ahead but it almost seems to me that such forward focus comes only after a time of looking back, she seems like she has just turned her gaze to the path again, that she is reluctant to go ahead but she knows she must. I imagine it is New Year, maybe, that this is a hatsumode, if you like, that this lady has reached some crossroads, that she has made some resolution.
I'm reading a lot into this. It's 5:33am on a Monday morning. In my sleep, I kept waking and thinking of the snow at Nezu shrine.
I'm reading a lot into this. It's 5:33am on a Monday morning. In my sleep, I kept waking and thinking of the snow at Nezu shrine.
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