About the Artist & Series
Kawanabe Kyōsai (1831–1889) was a prolific and wildly inventive artist of the late Edo to early Meiji era, renowned for his biting satire, mischievous humor, and bold imagination.  Often called the “demon painter,” Kyōsai seamlessly blended classical Japanese aesthetics with caricature, political commentary, and ribald humor.
 
This particular shunga woodblock print series titled The Great Tail (Ō-Shiri Monogatari, c. 1870) is one of Kyōsai’s rare and highly sought-after shunga (erotic art) series.  Unlike the more serene and intimate works of earlier shunga masters, Kyōsai’s approach bursts with energy and comic absurdity.  His figures are exaggerated, animated, and sometimes grotesque—mocking social conventions while celebrating the raw, unrestrained aspects of human desire.
 
This shunga woodblock print series captures Kyōsai’s signature mix of eroticism, wit, and theatrical chaos.  Each image tells a bawdy tale, revealing the artist’s playful rebellion against both artistic and societal norms of his time.  
 
Shunga picture measures 11.5 cm x 17.5 cm.  Good colors and impressions.  Decent condition with a some wear, soiling, bit of creasing, some water stains, album backing on reverse.
 
A Tumult of Tangled Desire
Here, Kyōsai dives headlong into sheer erotic mayhem.  Bodies twist, flip, and collide in an almost acrobatic frenzy—hair flying, limbs splayed, and pleasure taken from every possible angle.  Some are suspended midair, others bent in impossible positions, as if the laws of gravity have been abandoned in the heat of lust.
 
Unlike the homoerotic pieces in the series, this composition unleashes a chaotic, all-inclusive orgy where gender becomes just another element in the swirling storm of desire.  Kyōsai amplifies the humor and absurdity of sexual excess, turning the human form into both a vehicle of pleasure and a living joke on restraint.