Some artists of the shin-hanga period (revival of uikiyo-e traditional woodblock prints in the late 19th and early 20th century) studied Western painting, and the work of those artists is very interesting. Today’s print is by Kawase Hasui (1883-1957), who petitioned the Japanese printmaker Kaburagi to become his apprentice, and was told to go study Western style painting. After a couple of years of that training, he returned to Kaburagi and was accepted and trained in the tradition of ukiyo-e. His name Hasui was given him by his master Kaburagi, and means “water gushing from a spring”.
The print actually feels more like a Japanese-inflected Western picture, but no matter how you describe it, it is lovely. It actually reminds me of the Stow Wengenroth print Cool Forest, featured last week.
Nikko Kaido (1930) [Road from Edo (Tokyo) to Nikko]
