Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞) / Toyokuni III (三代豊国) (artist 1786 – 01/12/1865)
View of Tsuchiyama (Tsuchiyama no zu:
ca 1838
Signed: Kōchōrō Kunisada ga (香蝶楼国貞画)
Publisher: Sanoya Kihei
Censor's seal: kiwame
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston - publisher Moriya Jihei
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston - publisher Sanoya Kihei and Moriya Jihei
National Diet Library
Fujisawa Ukiyo-e Museum
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna
Östasiatiska Museet, Stockholm
Bryn Mawr
Honolulu Museum of Art
Google maps - Tsuchiyama
Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen (Rijksmuseum Volkenkunde, Leiden) - via Ritsumeikan University
This is number 50 in the series. The curatorial files at the Museum für angewandte Kunst in Vienna say: "The picture of the Tsuchiyama 土 山 station in the background was thought up by Kunisada himself, but like Hiroshige's picture of this station, it shows a rainy scene. Especially nice with Kunisada: The rain in the background continues in the front part of the picture with the woman with the umbrella. The landscape depicts the beginning of Tsuchiyama Station. On the left a shop that sells various goods."
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As with several other prints in the Kunisada set there is no Hiroshige template. However, there is one commonality between the prints produced by both artists: they both show this location in the rain. In Tokaido Landscapes: The Path from Hiroshige to Contemporary Artists, 2011, #50, p. 63, speaking of the original Hiroshige print it says in a text by Sasaki Moritoshi: "Tsuchiyama was famous for its rain, and it was an unwritten rule that this station would be depicted with a scene of rain in any Tōkaidō series."
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The Hiroshige print shows men crossing a bridge which is located at the Suzuka Pass between Tsuchiyama and Sakanoshita. The men had to cross this bridge to finally get access to Lake Biwa. None of this is apparent in the Kunisada version.
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Muneshige Narazaki in Masterworks of Ukiyo-e: Hiroshige, the 53 Stations of the Tōkaidō (p. 83) says: "Between Sakanoshita and Tsuchiyama - a distance of just under five miles - the road crossed the mountain pass of Suzuka. According to a song of the time, "The sun may be shining on the foothills, but Mount Suzuka is cloudy while Tsuchiyama is drenched with rain," suggesting that rain was no means uncommon in Tsuchiyama."
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Illustrated in a small color reproduction in Kunisada's Tokaido: Riddles in Japanese Woodblock Prints by Andreas Marks, Hotei Publishing, 2013, page 75, T24-50.
Sanoya Kihei (佐野屋喜兵衛) (publisher)
landscape prints (fūkeiga 風景画) (genre)