was a
JapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese
ukiyo-e' is a genre of Japanese woodblock prints and paintings produced between the 17th and the 20th centuries, featuring motifs of landscapes, tales from history, the theatre, and pleasure quarters...
artist, and one of the last great artists in that tradition. He was also referred to as
Andō Hiroshige (安藤 広重) (an irregular combination of family name and art name) and by the art name of
Ichiyūsai Hiroshige (一幽斎廣重).
Early life
Hiroshige was born in 1797 and named "Andō Tokutarō" (安藤 徳太郎) in the Yayosu
barracksBarracks are specialised buildings for permanent military accommodation; the word may apply to separate housing blocks or to complete complexes. Their main object is to separate soldiers from the civilian population and reinforce discipline, training and esprit de corps. They were sometimes called...
, just east of
Edo Castle, also known as , is a flatland castle that was built in 1457 by Ōta Dōkan. It is located in Chiyoda in Tokyo, then known as Edo, Toshima District, Musashi Province. Tokugawa Ieyasu established the Tokugawa shogunate here. It was the residence of the shogun and location of the shogunate, and also...
in the
Yaesuis a neighborhood in Chūō, Tokyo, Japan, located north of Ginza, west of Nihonbashi and Kyōbashi, and adjacent to the east side of Tokyo Station. The Yaesu exit, which faces Nihonbashi, is recent and primarily provides access to the Shinkansen platforms.-History:...
area of
Edo, also romanized as Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of the Japanese capital Tokyo, and was the seat of power for the Tokugawa shogunate which ruled Japan from 1603 to 1868...
(present-day
Tokyo, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
). His father was Andō Gen'emon, a hereditary retainer (of the
dōshin rank) of the shōgun. An official within the fire-fighting organization whose duty was to protect Edo Castle from fire, Gen'emon and his family, along with 30 other
samuraiis the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...
, lived in one of the 10 barracks; although their salary of 60
kokuThe is a Japanese unit of volume, equal to ten cubic shaku. In this definition, 3.5937 koku equal one cubic metre, i.e. 1 koku is approximately 278.3 litres. The koku was originally defined as a quantity of rice, historically defined as enough rice to feed one person for one year...
marked them as a minor family, it was a stable position, and a very easy one — Professor Seiichiro Takahashi characterizes a fireman's duties as largely consisting of revelry. The 30 samurai officials of a barracks, including Gen'emon, oversaw the efforts of the 300 lower-class workers who also lived within the barracks. A few scraps of evidence indicate he was tutored by another fireman who taught him in the Chinese-influenced
Kanō schoolThe ' is one of the most famous schools of Japanese painting. The Kanō school of painting was the dominant style of painting until the Meiji period.It was founded by Kanō Masanobu , a contemporary of Sesshū and student of Shūbun...
of painting.
Legend has it that Hiroshige determined to become a ukiyo-e artist when he saw the prints of his near-contemporary,
Hokusaiwas a Japanese artist, ukiyo-e painter and printmaker of the Edo period. He was influenced by such painters as Sesshu, and other styles of Chinese painting...
. (Hokusai published some of his greatest prints, such as
Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, in 1832—the year Hiroshige devoted himself full-time to his art.) From then to Hokusai's death in 1849, their landscape works competed for the same customers. More likely though, like many other low-ranked samurai, Hiroshige's salary was insufficient for his needs, and this motivated him to look into artisanal crafts to supplement his income. It was easy to balance his job and his artistic pursuits, as a fireman was only intermittently busy.
His natural inclination toward drawing marked him for an artistic life: as a child, he had played with miniature landscapes, and had already produced an impressive painting in 1806 of a procession of delegates to the
ShogunA was one of the hereditary military dictators of Japan from 1192 to 1867. In this period, the shoguns, or their shikken regents , were the de facto rulers of Japan though they were nominally appointed by the emperor...
from the
Ryukyu IslandsThe , also known as the , is a chain of islands in the western Pacific, on the eastern limit of the East China Sea and to the southwest of the island of Kyushu in Japan. From about 1829 until the mid 20th century, they were alternately called Luchu, Loochoo, or Lewchew, akin to the Mandarin...
, which was remarkably accomplished given his young age. He began by being taught the
Kano schoolThe ' is one of the most famous schools of Japanese painting. The Kanō school of painting was the dominant style of painting until the Meiji period.It was founded by Kanō Masanobu , a contemporary of Sesshū and student of Shūbun...
's style by his friend, Okajima Rinsai. These studies (such as a study of
perspectivePerspective in the graphic arts, such as drawing, is an approximate representation, on a flat surface , of an image as it is seen by the eye...
in the
DutchThe Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
images imported) prepared him for an apprenticeship. He first attempted to enter the studio of the extremely successful Utagawa Toyokuni but was rejected. Thus, he eventually embarked on an apprenticeship with the noted Utagawa Toyohiro instead of with Toyokuni. He was rejected again on his first attempt to enter Toyohiro's studio, but later accepted at the age of 15 in 1811. Toyohiro bestowed upon him the name "Utagawa" after only a year (instead of the usual period of two or three years). Hiroshige later took his master's name, becoming "Ichiyūsai Hiroshige."
In his early apprenticeship to Toyohiro, he showed little sign of artistic genius and did not publish many works. Despite earning an artistic name ("Ichiyūsai Hiroshige") and school license at the young age of 15, Hiroshige's first genuinely original publications came six years later in 1818. His
Eight Views of OmiThe Eight Views of Omi are the most scenic views of Omi Province, the present-day Shiga Prefecture, Japan. They were inspired by the Eight Views of Xiaoxiang in China...
and
Ten Famous Places in the Eastern Capital were moderately successful.This was also the year in which he was commended for his heroism in fighting a fire at Ogawa-nichi.
However, it was not until the publication of Hiroshige's
Famous Places in the Eastern Capital (1831) that he attracted real public attention. It is speculated that he whiled away the interim between his initial apprenticeship and 1818 engaging in work for Toyohiro's school, such as painting fans and other small items. This sort of work supported him as he continued to study the Kanō and Shijō painting styles. These were merely precursors to the series of prints that made him famous. In 1832, Hiroshige was invited to join an embassy of Shogunal officials to the
Imperial courtAn Imperial Court is the noble court of an empire .For example:*The noble court of an Emperor of China, Emperor of Japan, Emperor of Ethiopia, Emperor of Austria, Emperor of India, Emperor of Persia, etc....
. As his son, Nakajiro, could handle his fireman duties, Hiroshige joined the delegation. He carefully observed the
TōkaidōThe ' was the most important of the Five Routes of the Edo period, connecting Edo to Kyoto in Japan. Unlike the inland and less heavily travelled Nakasendō, the Tōkaidō travelled along the sea coast of eastern Honshū, hence the route's name....
Road (or "Eastern Sea Route"), which wended its way along the shoreline, through a snowy mountain range, past
Lake Biwais the largest freshwater lake in Japan, located in Shiga Prefecture , northeast of the former capital city of Kyoto. Because of its proximity to the ancient capital, references to Lake Biwa appear frequently in Japanese literature, particularly in poetry and in historical accounts of battles.-...
, and finally to
Kyōtois a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
. His series of prints,
The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tōkaidō, was extremely successful, and Hiroshige's reputation was assured.
In 1839, Hiroshige's first wife, a woman from the Okabe family, died. Hiroshige re-married to O-yasu, daughter of a farmer named Kaemon.
Hiroshige lived in the barracks until the age of 43. Gen'emon and his wife died in 1809, when Hiroshige was 12 years old, just a few months after his father had passed the position on to him. Although his duties as a fire-fighter were light, he never shirked these responsibilities, even after he entered training in Utagawa Toyohiro's studio. He eventually turned his firefighter position over to his brother, Tetsuzo, in 1823, who in turn passed on the duty to Hiroshige's son in 1832.
Hiroshige's students
Hiroshige IIwas a designer of ukiyo-e Japanese woodblock prints who was born as . He became a student and the adopted son of Hiroshige, then being given the artistic identity of, “Shigenobu”. When the senior Hiroshige died in 1858, Shigenobu married his master’s daughter, Otatsu. At that time he adopted the...
was a young print artist, Chinpei Suzuki, who married Hiroshige's daughter, Otatsu. He was given the artist name of "Shigenobu". Hiroshige intended to make Shigenobu his heir in all matters, and Shigenobu adopted the name "Hiroshige" after his master's death in 1858, and thus today is known as Hiroshige II. However, the marriage to Otatsu was troubled and in 1865 they separated. Otatsu was remarried to another former pupil of Hiroshige, Shigemasa, who appropriated the name of the lineage and today is known as
Hiroshige IIIwas a Japanese woodblock artist who was a student of Utagawa Hiroshige. He was also referred to as .Born , he was given the artistic name Shigemasa...
. Both Hiroshige II and Hiroshige III worked in a distinctive style based on that of Hiroshige, but neither achieved the level of success and recognition accorded to their master. Other students of Hiroshige I include Utagawa Shigemaru, Utagawa Shigekiyo, and
Utagawa Hirokage, also known as Ichiyusai Hirokage, was a Japanese designer of ukiyo-e woodblock prints, who was active from about 1855 to 1865. He was a pupil of Utagawa Hiroshige I. From 1860 to 1861, Hirokage designed the series of ōban size prints titled Edo meisho dōke zukushi...
.
Late life
In his declining years, Hiroshige still produced thousands of prints to meet the demand for his works, but few were as good as those of his early and middle periods. He never lived in financial comfort, even in old age.
In no small part, his prolific output stemmed from the fact that he was poorly paid per series, although he was still capable of remarkable art when the conditions were right — his great
One Hundred Famous Views of EdoOne Hundred Famous Views of Edo is a series of ukiyo-e prints begun and largely completed by the Japanese artist Hiroshige . The prints were first published in serialized form in 1856–59, with Hiroshige II completing the series after Hiroshige's death...
(名所江戸百景
Meisho Edo Hyakkei ) was paid for up-front by a wealthy
BuddhistBuddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
priest in love with the daughter of the publisher, Uoya Eikichi (a former fishmonger).
In 1856, Hiroshige "retired from the world," becoming a Buddhist monk; this was the year he began his
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo. He died aged 62 during the great Edo
choleraCholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...
epidemic of 1858 (whether the epidemic killed him is unknown) and was buried in a Zen Buddhist temple in
Asakusais a district in Taitō, Tokyo, Japan, most famous for the Sensō-ji, a Buddhist temple dedicated to the bodhisattva Kannon. There are several other temples in Asakusa, as well as various festivals.- History :...
. Just before his death, he left a poem:
- "I leave my brush in the East
- And set forth on my journey.
- I shall see the famous places in the Western Land."
(The Western Land in this context refers to the strip of land by the Tōkaidō between Kyoto and Edo, but it does double duty as a reference to the Paradise of the Amida Buddha).
Works
Hiroshige largely confined himself in his early work to common ukiyo-e themes such as women (美人画
bijin-ga) and actors (役者絵
yakusha-e). Then, after the death of Toyohiro, Hiroshige made a dramatic turnabout, with the 1831 landscape series
Famous Views of the Eastern Capital (東都名所
Tōto Meisho) which was critically acclaimed for its composition and colors. This set is generally distinguished from Hiroshige's many print sets depicting Edo by referring to it as
Ichiyūsai Gakki, a title derived from the fact that he signed it as Ichiyūsai Hiroshige. With
The Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō (1833–1834), his success was assured. These designs were drawn from Hiroshige's actual travels of the full distance of 490 kilometres (304.5 mi). They included details of date, location, and anecdotes of his fellow travelers, and were immensely popular. In fact, this series was so popular that he reissued it in three versions, one of which was made jointly with Kunisada. Hiroshige went on to produce more than 2000 different prints of Edo and
post stationswere post stations during the Edo period in Japan, generally located on one of the Edo Five Routes or one of its sub-routes. They were also called shukueki . These post stations were places where travelers could rest on their journey around the nation...
Tōkaidō, as well as series such as
The Sixty-nine Stations of the Kisokaidō (1834–1842) and
Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (1852–1858). Of his estimated total of 5000 designs, these landscapes comprised the largest proportion of any genre.
He dominated landscape printmaking with his unique brand of intimate, almost small-scale works compared against the older traditions of landscape painting descended from Chinese landscape painters such as Sesshu. The travel prints generally depict travelers along famous routes experiencing the special attractions of various stops along the way. They travel in the rain, in snow, and during all of the seasons. In 1856, working with the publisher Uoya Eikichi, he created a series of luxury edition prints, made with the finest printing techniques including true gradation of color, the addition of
micaThe mica group of sheet silicate minerals includes several closely related materials having highly perfect basal cleavage. All are monoclinic, with a tendency towards pseudohexagonal crystals, and are similar in chemical composition...
to lend a unique iridescent effect, embossing, fabric printing, blind printing, and the use of glue printing (wherein ink is mixed with glue for a glittery effect).
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (issued serially between 1856 and 1859) was immensely popular. The set was published posthumously and some prints had not been completed — he had created over 100 on his own, but two were added by Hiroshige II after his death.
Influence
Hiroshige was a member of the
Utagawa schoolThe was a group of Japanese woodblock print artists, founded by Toyoharu. His pupil, Toyokuni I, took over after Toyoharu's death and raised the group to become the most famous and powerful woodblock print school for the remainder of the 19th century....
, along with
KunisadaUtagawa Kunisada was the most popular, prolific and financially successful designer of ukiyo-e woodblock prints in 19th-century Japan...
and Kuniyoshi. The Utagawa school comprised dozens of artists, and stood at the forefront of nineteenth century woodblock prints. Particularly noteworthy for their actor and historical prints, members of the Utagawa school were nonetheless well-versed in all of the popular genres.
During Hiroshige’s time, the print industry was booming, and the consumer audience for prints was growing rapidly. Prior to this time, most print series had been issued in small sets, such as ten or twelve designs per series. Increasingly large series were produced to meet demand, and this trend can be seen in Hiroshige’s work, such as
The Sixty-nine Stations of the Kisokaidō and
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo.
In terms of style, Hiroshige is especially noted for using unusual vantage points, seasonal allusions, and striking colors. He adapted Western principles of perspective and receding space to his own works in order to achieve a sense of realistic depth. In particular, he worked extensively within the realm of
meisho-e (名所絵) pictures of famous places. During the Edo period, tourism was also booming, leading to increased popular interest in travel. Travel guides abounded, and towns appeared along routes such as the Tōkaidō, a road that connected Edo with Kyoto. In the midst of this burgeoning travel culture, Hiroshige drew upon his own travels, as well as tales of others’ adventures, for inspiration in creating his landscapes. For example, in
The Fifty-three Stations on the Tōkaidō (1833), he illustrates anecdotes from
Travels on the Eastern Seaboard (東海道中膝栗毛
Tōkaidōchū Hizakurige, 1802–1809) by
Jippensha Ikkuwas the pen name of Shigeta Sadakazu , a Japanese writer active during the late Edo period of Japan. He lived primarily in Edo in the service of samurai, but also spent some time in Osaka as a townsman...
, a comedy describing the adventures of two bumbling travelers as they make their way along the same road.
Hiroshige’s
The Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō (1833–1834) and
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (1856–1858) greatly influenced
FrenchThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
Impressionists such as Monet.
Vincent Van GoghVincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...
copied two of the
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo which were among his collection of ukiyo-e prints. Hiroshige's style also influenced the
Mir iskusstvaMir iskusstva was a Russian magazine and the artistic movement it inspired and embodied, which was a major influence on the Russians who helped revolutionize European art during the first decade of the 20th century. From 1909, many of the miriskusniki also contributed to the Ballets Russes...
, a 20th century
RussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n art movement in which
Ivan BilibinIvan Yakovlevich Bilibin was a 20th-century illustrator and stage designer who took part in the Mir iskusstva and contributed to the Ballets Russes. Throughout his career, he was inspired by Slavic folklore....
was a major artist.
Gallery
Ukiyo-e from
Kachō-ga : Pictures of Flowers and Birds:
Some Ukiyo-e from
The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido (東海道五十三次
Tōkaidō Gojūsan-tsugi ) :
Some Ukiyo-e from
One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (名所江戸百景
Meisho Edo Hyakkei ) :
From
The most beautiful place in Tokyo (東京名所第一の勝景,
Tōkyō meisho dai ichi no shōkei)
External links
- Hiroshige's works at Tokyo Digital Museum
- Images & descriptions of works by Hiroshige and his contemporaries
- Hiroshige- A short article
- Ando Hiroshige- Free source of information and pictures
- Hiroshige at WebMuseum Paris
- Christian Science Monitor article
- Profile of Hiroshige
- Brooklyn Museum: Exhibitions: One Hundred Famous Views of Edo
- Utagawa Hiroshige at Hill-Stead Museum, Farmington Connecticut
- 53 stages of the Tōkaidō (road)
The ' was the most important of the Five Routes of the Edo period, connecting Edo to Kyoto in Japan. Unlike the inland and less heavily travelled Nakasendō, the Tōkaidō travelled along the sea coast of eastern Honshū, hence the route's name....
by Hiroshige and Ukiyo-e' is a genre of Japanese woodblock prints and paintings produced between the 17th and the 20th centuries, featuring motifs of landscapes, tales from history, the theatre, and pleasure quarters...
artist in Heiseiis the current era name in Japan. The Heisei era started on 8 January 1989, the first day after the death of the reigning Emperor, Hirohito. His son, Akihito, succeeded to the throne...
period
- Hiroshige resource site