A courtesan reading a letter

鈴木春重筆 文を読む美人図
A slender young woman stands on a veranda, adjusting her hairpin with one hand while inspecting a folded letter. Who is it from? Letters often allude to romance or illicit love when they appear in paintings from the Edo period. This woman, who may be a geisha or entertainer, seems to have received a letter from her lover. The inscription in the upper left refers to an immortal who is so captivated by a woman’s beauty— specifically the sight of her exposed white legs—that he loses the power to fly and tumbles to the ground.
The painter of this work is best known as Shiba Kokan. He signed his paintings with the name Suzuki Harushige during the period when he followed the style of his teacher Suzuki Harunobu (1724–1770), a painter and woodblock print artist famous for portraying delicate young women. The seal on this painting reads "Harunobu," following the practice of some teachers who allowed accomplished students to use their seal.