Mimasaka Province- Yamabushi Valley Possibly 1853

Utagawa Hiroshige created this woodblock print entitled Mimasaka Province- Yamabushi Valley. It’s part of the series “Sixty-odd Famous Places in the Provinces”, of which he made many between 1853 and 1856. We see a sudden downpour in a wooded landscape, with the sky obscured and two figures hurrying through the rain. This was a time of great change and social mobility in Japan, with new opportunities for commoners to travel and explore, something which had previously been the preserve of the elite. Hiroshige was acutely attuned to these shifts. Japanese woodblock prints were often produced for a mass market and were, to a degree, shaped by that popular audience. It’s therefore interesting to consider what it was about images of landscape and the ‘common’ experience of travel that so captivated the people of the time. To understand more about this period, we can look at travel guides, diaries, and social histories to better appreciate the public role of art in Japan at this time.