Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, 1844

While browsing the internet, I came upon this beauty of a painting. My initial thought was, “God, this is a cool Metallica shirt.” But then I became saddened when I realized this painting was not a promotion of one of my favorite metal bands. Instead, Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre by Utagawa Kuniyoshi happens to be a cultural landmark for Japanese art. Though for the record, I personally would head bang in a shirt with this Skeleton Spectre on it. He stands up there alongside Iron Maiden’s Eddie or Megadeth’s Vic Rattlehead. 

Utagawa Kuniyoshi’s art embodied the last great moment of the Ukiyo-e movement in Japanese art. Ukiyo-e translates to “pictures of the floating world.” The idea behind the movement seems rather abstract, but I believe it would not be a stretch to compare Ukiyo-e to European Romanticism. In Kuniyoshi’s time, many of the paintings or woodcuts tried to capture the spirit of Japan, so they focused on landscapes and cultural icons. In Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre, the samurai Mitsukuni has been sent by the Emperor of Japan to bring the Witch Takiyasha to justice. Takiyasha’s father, who had already been slain in combat, had led a rebellion against the emperor. The Witch then continued on her father’s crusade. Mitsukuni confronts her only to find she has the magical ability to summon a gigantic Skeleton Spectre who will do anything she says. Kuniyoshi illustrates the final confrontation between the Witch and Mitsukuni. This tale had captivated Japan for around nine hundred years when Kuniyoshi’s painting finally came out.

The Skeleton Spectre, much like Murray on a Dio album cover, takes up a majority of the painting. In fact, one could say he consumes half of the whole painting. The abstract yellow hay that separates Mitsukuni and the Spectre diagonally divides the painting in two. Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre also is a triptych (as Kuniyoshi was very much inspired by European paintings he had seen since the opening up of Japan), which divides the painting vertically into threes. The Witch gets her own panel on the left. Notice the zigzag bars coming down on her head and how her gaze creates a dent in the yellow hay. This mimics the downward force of the Skeleton Spectre looming over the Mitsukuni. Though the Skeleton’s hand peeling back the hay takes the Witch’s piercing gaze a couple steps farther.

While I may not have gotten the metal band I wanted when I first looked at this painting, I can certainly say that I did receive a new appreciation for Japanese art. To be honest (and this may come as a shock to you), our Renaissance Art History class does not put much emphasis on Japanese artwork. So I can proudly say I am all the more cultured in my art history studies thanks to Kuniyoshi’s painting… and my love for intense metal music.