東海道五十三次 土山 春の雨

Tsuchiyama—a travelers' station on the road known as the Tōkaidō, in the mountains just before the road ends at Kyoto— is famous for its rain, and rain is central to this print's composition. The gentle melancholy of a spring shower is suggested by delicate, crisscrossing vertical lines that subdue a daimyō procession.

Utagawa Hiroshige, one of Japan's foremost landscapists, designed two extremely popular series: Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō and One Hundred Famous Views of Edo.

Credit: Rogers Fund, 1918