Utagawa Hiroshige II (1826 -1869) One Hundred Famous Views In The Various Provinces: Noge in Yokohama Bushu Province, 1859 - 1861. Oban.
This is a lovely landscape view from one of Hiroshige II’s finest series. This calm scene unveils itself from the foreground bridge - seemingly arbitrarily truncated in the foreground - to the great river that comes to fill the mass of the print. The composition here is fascinating; Monet and the European Impressionists such as Degas experimented with the framing effect of the new photography in their paintings during the 1870’s and yet here is Hiroshige II, like his teacher Hiroshige before him, creating a naturalistic view solely by means of viewpoint and composition. It is often said that later Japanese art owes much to European influence but we see here just one example of how in reality, the reverse is also true.
Hiroshige II was a pupil of the great Hiroshige. Originally given the name Shigenobu he was adopted by Hiroshige when his own son died in 1845. When Hiroshige died in 1858, Shigenobu took his master’s name. He married Hiroshige’s daughter but divorced in 1865 and died in poverty four years later. He continued the style of his master and his work is very highly regarded. This print is a scene from his Views of the Provinces series. A lovely landscape view of the river with a bridge in the foreground, delicate shading of the river, the sky and the trees.
Full margins; a slight stain, barely visible, on the right side. Very good colour and impression, very good overall.
36 x 25 cm.
