Shinsui 伊東深水: Evening at the Tama River 多摩川原の夕 (Sold)

Artist: Itō Shinsui 伊東深水
Title: Evening on the River, Tamagawa 多摩川原の夕
Date: 1917, 2nd month

Beautifully expressive pre-earthquake evening winterscape that packs a surprisingly strong artistic punch. We see a woman carrying a harvesting basket heading away from the viewer along a path that crosses the Tama riverbed. The visual story would indicate that she is heading home to the cozy house seen in the distance with the lit yellow window at far right. Along the riverbank a row of trees is silhouetted against the evening sky. With the rich, velvety feeling that is characteristic of works printed before the 1923 earthquake.  Shinsui was still a teenager in 1917, but he was stupendous right out of the gate. In this evocative pre-earthquake design, we can see the influence that this and other works done by Shinsui at this time had on the works of his contemporary, Kawase Hasui. The artist himself described this as a "scene of solitude, created by the winter twilight". As noted in "The new wave", the major compositional elements are placed along a distant horizon, amplifying the feeling of solitude. A scarce, pre-earthquake design from the first and only edition. Watanabe has made his seal at lower right part of the woodblock design, and has printed the title and date information in deep red ink at left, both the better to be visible but not distracting against the dark palette. The Tama River winds for more than eighty miles from the high mountains of Yamanashi Prefecture to the waters of Tokyo Bay.

Condition: Excellent impression, color and condition.
Dimensions: 21.8 x 32 cm
Publisher: Watanabe Shozaburo
Literature: Tadasu Watanabe, Ito Shinsui: All the Woodblock Prints, 1992, p. 24, pl. 6. Reigle Stephens, Amy, gen. ed., The new wave: Twentieth-century Japanese prints from the Robert O. Muller Collection, 1993, p. 182, pl. 232.  See the Art Institute of Chicago and the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art.
Signature: Shinsui

SKU: SNI047