Maekawa Senpan 千帆 : Karuizawa Eruption of Asamayama (SOLD)

Artist: Maekawa Senpan 前川千帆 (1888-1960)

Title: Karuizawa Eruption of Asamayama

Series: 日本風景版画 Landscape Prints of Japan  Date: 1929  Size: 19.4 x 25.5 cm

What seems like a peaceful mountain scene with a lone skier on the roadway is actually a picture of the eruption of Moutn Asama; we see a yellow plume at the top of the snow-covered mountain and then dark grey clinging to the lower sky.

It was a Canadian minister who first popularized Karuizawa in the 1880s, especially for foreign visitors. Today the residents and visitors are mostly Japanese, as it a popular place for city dwellers to escape the summer heat; Karuizawa is still something like the Hamptons of Tokyo, with many wealthy Japanese having a second home there.

The artist achieved Western recognition through inclusion in Oliver Statler's Modern Japanese Prints: An Art Reborn (1956) and James Michener's portfolio and book The Modern Japanese Print. An Appreciation (1962).  He "was one of the great personalities of twentieth-century Japanese prints, a man of notable independence, and a political radical, yet a staunch traditionalist and supporter of Japanese folk life and customs."

Condition: Excellent impression, color and condition. Publisher: Self-published

Signature: Sealed with the artist’s seal "Han"

SKU: MKS012