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Your galleryNihon Bridge seen in the Snow (Nihonbashi setchu no kei), from the series "Famous Views in the Eastern Capital (Toto meisho)"
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Start with the people crossing the snowy bridge at the bottom, then climb past the white roofs and dark trees to Mount Fuji and the red sky.
On a sheet only 12.5 centimeters wide, a format the Art Institute records as chu-tanzaku, Hiroshige stacks a whole city view in snow: the arched Nihon Bridge, white roofs along the river, a dark band of trees and Mount Fuji beyond. People cross the bridge with loads on their heads and on shoulder poles, and a strip of red colors the sky. Fuji, a cultural and religious icon, appears again and again in Japanese prints.
Color woodblock print; chu-tanzaku · 36.7 × 12.5 cm · Art Institute of Chicago
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Details and source
- Museum title
- Nihon Bridge seen in the Snow (Nihonbashi setchu no kei), from the series "Famous Views in the Eastern Capital (Toto meisho)"
- Artist
- Utagawa Hiroshige 歌川 広重 Japanese, 1797–1858
- Date
- 1837/38
- Medium
- Color woodblock print; chu-tanzaku
- Dimensions
- 36.7 × 12.5 cm (14 7/16 × 4 15/16 in.)
- Credit line
- Gift of Chester W. Wright
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.