New Year’s Sake Bottles and Shrine Plaque (Ema) for the Year of the Rooster - Katsushika Hokusen

A delicate Japanese woodblock print featuring New Year symbols, including sake bottles and a rooster-themed shrine plaque.

This woodblock print by Katsushika Hokusen belongs to the genre of surimono, a form of privately commissioned, limited-edition print often exchanged among poets and connoisseurs in Edo-period Japan. Surimono prints were typically produced with high-quality paper and technical refinements, such as metallic pigments or embossing, to reflect the refined tastes of their patrons.

The composition features a pair of sake bottles decorated with red and blue patterns, resting upon a black lacquered stand. Beside them sits an ema, a small wooden plaque traditionally used at Shinto shrines for writing prayers or wishes. This specific ema depicts a rooster and chicks, serving as a symbolic reference to the Year of the Rooster in the Chinese zodiac. The inclusion of these items suggests a celebration of the New Year, a period marked by ritual, renewal, and the exchange of gifts.

Hokusen, a student of the famous Katsushika Hokusai, demonstrates a mastery of balance and negative space. The calligraphic text integrated into the left side of the composition provides a poetic context, linking the visual elements to the literary culture of the time. The muted, earthy tones of the paper contrast with the precise, controlled application of colour on the sake bottles and the rooster. The work avoids excessive ornamentation, focusing instead on the quiet arrangement of objects that carry specific cultural weight. By capturing these ephemeral items, the artist preserves a moment of domestic celebration and traditional observance. The print remains a clear example of the technical precision and thematic subtlety characteristic of the surimono tradition, offering a glimpse into the private aesthetic exchanges of the nineteenth-century Japanese literati.