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I just finished Japan Journeys: Famous Woodblock Prints of Cultural Sights in Japan by Andreas Marks. This is mostly a picture book, featuring about 200 Japanese woodblock prints (ukiyo-e / 浮世絵). Artists include Hokusai (北斎), Hiroshige (広重), Utamaro (歌麿), and Kunisada (国貞).
The prints include a brief description and some historical context. They are arranged by location.
While I thoroughly enjoyed this book, I have a couple of critiques/recommendations should anyone want to do something similar.
The first is that some, if not many, of the ukiyo-e are too small. The book is inexpensive (under $20 for a hardback and all in full color), but I would have preferred a larger book, both in terms of page size and length, so that the prints could be seen in more detail. Some of them are stamp size, and they all should have been at least 8″ on the short side.
The second is that I would have liked to have also seen modern photos of these places, even if the places look radically different today. I’m imagining something like what I’ve done here and here.
On an unseasonably cold evening in late November, we came upon this man painting (I think) an original ukiyo-e in the Nihonbashi part of Tokyo. If you want to see the finished result you’ll need to roam the streets of Nihonbashi after (or before) business hours as this can only be seen when the shop is closed.
The location is approximately here.
Japan has some amazing pine trees, and this is one of the better ones. The seed for this Karasaki Matsu (Pine Tree) is said to have come from the famous pine tree depicted in the ukiyo-e pictured below (Night Rain at Karasaki) by Hiroshige. The statue to the left is Yamato Takeru and is the oldest bronze statue in Japan, dating back to 1880.