1838
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Dominant colour
Evening Snow at Asuka Hill, from the series Eight Views of the Environs of Edo is a 1838 by Utagawa Hiroshige, a Romanticism work, depicting Snow, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see a quiet hillside at dusk, blanketed in fresh snow. A few travelers trudge up the slope, their figures small against the white expanse. Bare trees stand like dark skeletons, and a faint glow lingers in the sky. This print was made for a poetry club—its first version had three poems at the top. Later, the artist reissued it for the public with just one poem about heavy snow. The change shows how prints could move from private circles to everyday viewers. To see how snow was used in other Japanese prints, look up *Utagawa Hiroshige*.
This print series was first privately produced for the Taihaidō poetry club led by a “wild” or comic verse (kyōka) poet with the humorous pen name Taihaidō Donshō (or Nomimasu), which translates to “Hall of the Large Cup, Swallow a Liter (or Drink).” The initial print had three poems by members of the club at the top. This print, released as part of a public set of the series later on, has but a single poem, not featured in the original, which reads: The snow falling heavily in the dusk not only covers up signs that warn against breaking branches of the cherry trees on Asuka Hill, but breaks…
Read the full account in the museum source.
Utagawa Hiroshige (歌川 広重) or Andō Hiroshige (安藤 広重), born Andō Tokutarō (安藤 徳太郎; 1797 – 12 October 1858), was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist, considered the last great master of that tradition.
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