Ruebens, The Three Graces. They would probably  be quite beautiful by Heian standards, assuming, of course, they would modify their eyebrows, blacken their teeth, etc.  But this depiction of them would be disgustingly ugly to Heian Japanese--because they are nude. And not only to Heian-period Japanese. It was not until approximately the turn of the twentieth century that the nude became a legitimate subject of artistic depiction in Japan.

 

 


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