From the series 'One Hundred Famous Views of Edo': Bikuni bridge in snow
Medium:Woodblock print on paper
Geography: Japan
Date: 1858
Period: Edo period
Object number: 926.18.913
Credit Line: Sir Edmund Walker Collection
Not on view
DescriptionOne Hundred Famous Views of Edo is a series of 119 woodblock prints depicting famous views in Edo (present Tokyo) by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797 - 1858), the great master of Japanese landscape print in the late Edo period (1603 - 1868). This large-volume series is considered as one of Hiroshige's masterpieces, well-known for its high-level printing techniques, such as gradations and embossing, and vivid colourings with newly imported chemical pigments, as well as novel compositions with extremely enlarged motifs in front, which appear in more than one third of the 119 images. Woodblock prints and illustrated books depicting meisho, or famous places in Edo were not uncommon at that time as souvenir for visitors from outside the city. Hiroshige went beyond the tradition by choosing new places and eliminating some established meisho, reflecting Edo townspeople' increased awareness towards a long history of their own city. This series thus retains not only artistic value, but it is also significant as a historical material to understand people's sense of townscape back then. Japanese print designs including Hiroshige's landscape greatly inspired Western painters in the late 19th century, such as Van Gogh, who made exact copies of a few images from this series. This print is of Suijin Grove, the Uchi River and Sekiya Village from the Vicinity of Massaki
Cataloguer: Dr. Hugh Wylie (ROM Staff, 1980-1999)
Collection:
JapanDepartment: Art & Culture: Japan
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