Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞) / Toyokuni III (三代豊国) (artist 1786 – 01/12/1865)
View of Totsuka (Totsuka no zu: 戸塚図) from the chuban series Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō Road (Tōkaidō gojūsan tsugi no uchi: 東海道五十三次之内)
ca 1838
Signed: Kōchōrō Kunisada (香蝶楼国貞)
Publisher: Sanoya Kihei
Censor's seal: kiwame
Museum of Fine Art, Boston
National Diet Library
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna
British Museum - Hiroshige's 'Totsuka Motomachi betsudo' version
Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art - they date their copy to 1836
Bryn Mawr
Honolulu Museum of Art
The Spencer Museum of Art
Carnegie Museum of Art
University of Michigan This is number six in the series. The curatorial files at Museum für angewandte Kunst in Vienna say: "The landscape representation in the background corresponds to that of Hiroshige. Instead of the rider who is just getting off his horse to take a break at the tea house, this figure has been moved further to the right and the people have been changed."
Gian Carlo Calza in his description in Hiroshige: The Master of Nature of the original Hiroshige print re-imagined in this scene said: "Evening has arrived and a number of wayfarers who had left in the early morning from Nihonbashi, the centre of Edo and the starting point for the Tōkaidō, have reached Totsuka, where they will spend the night after having travelled some forty kilometres. The man, dismounting with some difficulty from his horse while the stable boy on the right holds the animal's bridle, is greeted by a maidservant. He has arrived at the Komeya, which is described on the sign as a rice store that also offers services as an inn. The woman in the centre [of the Hiroshige - not seen here], in front of the stone lantern, has just arrived and is removing her travelling hat. Just behind her there is a milestone bearing the words: "road for Kamakura to the left"."
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From Hiroshige: l'art du voyage, Paris, 2012, p. 58 we learn that the little bridge is spanning the Kashiogawa (柏尾川).
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In Masterworks of Ukiyo-e: Hiroshige, the 53 Stations of the Tōkaidō by Muneshige Narazaki. 1969, p. 33 it says: "Hanging under the eaves are boards on which are written the names of the traveling parties stopping at the inn. The stone milepost in the center of the print points the way to the Tsurugaoka Hachiman Shrine in Kamakura, about five miles distant....Totsuka now is also a ward of Yokohama."
Totsuka is about 5⅔ miles from Hodogaya. It was eventually swallowed up by Yokohama, too.
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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 63, T24-06.
Sanoya Kihei (佐野屋喜兵衛) (publisher)
landscape prints (fūkeiga 風景画) (author)