| Hiroshige
(1797-1858), Japanese painter and printmaker, known especially for his
landscape prints. The last great figure of the Ukiyo-e, or popular,
school of printmaking, he transmuted everyday landscapes into intimate,
lyrical scenes that made him even more successful than his contemporary,
Hokusai. Ando Hiroshige was born in Edo (now Tokyo) and at first, like
his father, was a fire warden. |
| The
prints of Hokusai are said to have first kindled in him the desire to
become an artist, and he entered the studio of Utagawa Toyohiro, a renowned
painter, as an apprentice. In 1812 Hiroshige took his teacher's name
(a sign of graduation), signing his work Utagawa Hiroshige. |
| His
career falls roughly into three periods. From 1811 to about 1830 he
created prints of traditional subjects such as young women and actors.
During the next 15 years he won fame as a landscape artist, reaching
a peak of success and achievement in 1833 when his masterpiece, the
print series Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido (scenes on the highway
connecting Edo and Kyoto), was published. He maintained this high level
of craftmanship in other travel series, including Celebrated Places
in Japan and Sixty-nine Stations on the Kiso Highway. The work he did
during the third period, the last years of his life, is sometimes of
lesser quality, as he appears to have hurriedly met the demands of popularity.
He died of cholera on October 12, 1858, in Edo. |
| With
Hokusai, Hiroshige dominated the popular art of Japan in the first half
of the 19th century. His work was not as bold or innovative as that
of the older master, but he captured, in a poetic, gentle way that all
could understand, the ordinary person's experience of the Japanese landscape
as well as the varied moods of memorable places at different times.
His total output was immense, some 5400 prints in all. |
