Utagawa Hiroshige III (artist 1842 – 1894)

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Biography:

Utagawa Hiroshige III 三代目歌川広重 (1842-1894)

Sources: The Hotei Encyclopedia of Japanese Woodblock Prints, Amy Reigle Newland, Hotei Publishing Company, 2005, p. 504; Picturing Westernization and Modernization: A Woodblock Print Collection from Late 19th Century Japan, Izumi Koide, June 16, 2006, a paper delivered at the WORLD LIBRARY AND INFORMATION CONGRESS: 72ND IFLA GENERAL CONFERENCE AND COUNCIL 20-24 August 2006, Seoul, Korea http://archive.ifla.org/IV/ifla72/papers/085-Koide-en.pdf and as otherwise footnoted.

Other names used: Utagawa (Ando, Goto), Tokubei, Torakichi, Isshosai, Shigemasa, Shigetora, Ichiryūsai 一立斎, Ryūsai 立斎 Family name: Andō 安藤

Utagawa Hiroshige III (三代目歌川広重) was the son of a shipbuilder in Edo’s Fukagawa district, later adopted by a restaurant owner named Ryotei, he became a student of Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858) in his mid-teens. With his master’s death in 1858 he studied with Utagawa Hiroshige II (1826-1869), who was married to Hiroshige’s daughter, Otatsu. Reportedly his first work was the illustration of the ninth volume of the ehon (picture book) Edo miyage (Picture-book of Edo Souvenirs, 1864). With the dissolution of the Hiroshige II’s marriage and Hiroshige II's subsequent return to Yokohama in 1865, Hiroshige III married Otatsu and succeeded to the Hiroshige name.

While none of the lyricism seen in the work of Hiroshige I is detected in his prints, he created quite interesting prints depicting the new port city of Yokohama and Tokyo with their Western buildings, steam locomotives (such as the triptych Steam Train Along Tokyo’s Takanawa Coastline (Tokyo Takanawa kaigan joki kisha tetsudeo no zu 1871), and exotic foreigners. It is said that the artist referred to himself as "Meiji" Hiroshige.1 He designed many print series, three of the best known being Famous Views of Tokyo (Tokyo meisho no uchi, 1879), Famous Places in Tōkai: The Revised 53 Stations (Tōkai Meisho Kaisei 53 Eki, 1876) and Dai Nippon Bussan Zue (The Greater Japan Products, 1877).

While Hiroshige III may not have been a great artist, he was a popular artist, ranking among the top five in a 1880 list of ukiyo-e artists, Kokoku shoga mekia ichiran, along with Toyohara Kunichika (1835–1900), Ogata Gekkô (1859-1920), Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892) and Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915).2

1 The World of the Meiji Print: Impressions of a New Civilization, Julia Meech-Pekarik, Weatherhill, 1986, p. 92.
2 Courage and Silence: A Study of the Life and Color Woodblock Prints of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi: 1839-1952, Roger Start Keyes, 1982, p. 51.