Night Rain at Ōyama, from the series "Eight Famous Views of Kanagawa"
Utagawa Toyokuni II Japanese
Not on view
Utagawa Toyoshige, student of the first Toyokuni (1769–1825), succeeded to his master's name as Toyokuni II in 1825. In Utagawa genealogy, Toyoshige and the famous Hiroshige are something like cousins. The most famous print in the series "Eight Famous Views of Kanagawa," set west of Edo, is Night Rain at Ōyama. Mount Ōyama, the ancient center of mountain asceticism where the guardian king Fudō Myōō was enshrined, became a popular pilgrimage site during the eighteenth century. Prayers for rain were offered there, and it became standard to depict this place in the rain. The mysterious appearance of the mountain at night, with Mount Fuji visible in the distance, is achieved by rendering it without outline, in pointed contrast to the sharply delineated torrents in varying tones.
Despite differences between the steady downpour in Hiroshige's Karasaki print (JP52) they share an overall atmospheric effect..
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