Lady Shizu, historically known as Shizuka Gozen, is one of the most famous and tragic figures in Japanese history. She was a renowned 12th-century shirabyoshi (court dancer) and the lover of the tragic hero Minamoto no Yoshitsune.
When sketching Lady Shizu—most notably in his instructional manual Ippitsu Gafu (Album of Drawings with One Stroke of the Brush)—Hokusai relied on the visual language of Japanese kana (specifically hiragana). Using the ippitsugaki (one-stroke) technique, Hokusai rendered her entire form—from the curve of her back to the trailing edge of her robes—with a single, virtually unbroken movement of the brush.