# Abalone Divers off the Coast of Ise, from an Untitled Landscape Series

- By: Utagawa Kunisada (Japanese, 1786–1865)
- By: Yamaguchiya Tobei (Japanese)
- Date: early 1830s
- Medium: color woodblock print
- Classification: Print
- Dimensions: Overall: 27.4 x 40 cm (10 13/16 x 15 3/4 in.)
- Culture: Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)
- Credit line: Anonymous Gift
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/1916.944)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1916.944/1916.944_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Little Ones profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Prolific printmaker Utagawa Kunisada produced this seascape of abalone fishing as part of a series of untitled landscape prints in the early Tenpō era (1830–44). In the coastal city of Ise on Japan’s main island of Honshu, female divers called ama traditionally did the physically demanding job of harvesting shellfish such as abalone. These marine snails are valuable for their edible flesh, and their iridescent inner shell is a source of mother-of-pearl. This print depicts three stages of the harvest: One diver plunges into the water, another holds her breath while prying an abalone off the rocks with a blade, and a third ama conveys her successful harvest to the beaming fishermen on the boat.