Comparable Sales
Same-artist public sales ranked by medium, creation year, dimensions and sale recency.
No public-rights comparable sales meet the current evidence criteria. RELICT does not fill the table with research-only or licensed-only facts.
The Cleveland Museum of Art · The Kelvin Smith Collection, given by Mrs. Kelvin Smith
Museum
Courtesan Reading a Letter
early 1800s
Market Intelligence
Observed sale facts, comparable evidence, artist index history and modeled research remain separate.
Last known price—0 matched observed sales
Observed median—
Observed sales0
Artist index—
No rights-cleared normalized observed sale is attached to this artwork. No synthetic price history is shown.
Artist index unavailableNo completed public artist-index build exists.Artist-level context is not an artwork valuation.
Evidence ranked
Provenance
Public?–1974
(David Newman, London, England, sold to Mr. and Mrs. Kelvin Smith)
1974–1985
The Kelvin Smith Collection, Cleveland, OH, given by Mrs. Kelvin [Eleanor Armstrong] Smith [1899–199...
1985–
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Source provenance text
(David Newman, London, England, sold to Mr. and Mrs. Kelvin Smith) The Kelvin Smith Collection, Cleveland, OH, given by Mrs. Kelvin [Eleanor Armstrong] Smith [1899–1998] to the Cleveland Museum of Art The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
The Cleveland Museum of Artconfidence 100%
Exhibitions
PublicSource exhibition text
Japanese Screens from the Museum and Cleveland Collections. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 23-May 8, 1977). A Private World: Japanese and Chinese Art from the Kelvin Smith Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 14-November 13, 1988). Unfolding Beauty: Japanese Screens from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 15-September 16, 2001). Visions of Japan: Prints and Paintings from Cleveland Collections. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 12, 2004-April 10, 2005). Japan’s Floating World 日本の浮世. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (April 8-October 9, 2022). Japanese Gallery 236 Rotation. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (January 13–November 16, 2015).
The Cleveland Museum of Artconfidence 100%
Sourced Overview Evidence
Ukiyo-e artists and collaborating poets introduced imagery from classical literature to add layers of meaning to their work. Here, a courtesan pores over a letter from an admirer, and the poem next to her reads as follows: "Having been asked to stay over, / I stayed on—and for a good reason. / It’s way past midnight / and the lady is that (legendary implorer) Amagoi Komachi." Midnight was closing time in Yoshiwara, the licensed brothel district of Edo (now Tokyo). Amagoi, or “Praying for Rain,” Komachi refers to ninth-century poet Ono no Komachi—known for her compelling verse and great beauty—and one of her famous compositions.
The Cleveland Museum of Artconfidence 100%
Evidence state
0 observed sales · 0 comparable sales · 3 structured provenance events · 5 structured exhibitions.
Place Of OriginShort DescriptionProvenance TextExhibition HistoryCredit Line