About This Print

Notes on the Original Edition

Source: Modern Japanese Prints, Dorothy Blair, re-print of the 1931 and 1936 exhibition catalogs, The Toledo Museum of Art, 1997.
Print #164. Pagoda In Rain At Dusk (Ame ni Kururu To)
A rainy evening at Ueno Park, Tokyo, in the district called Yanaka.  The woman in the foreground wears a rain-coat and high rain-shoes; on her arm she carries something wrapped in a furoshiki, or square of silk used by the Japanese to encase parcels of all kind.
Signed at lower right, Shiro; red seal, Shiro.  Left margin: the Japanese title; the date, “Showa Shichi Nen Banshun” (Late spring, 7th Year of Showa [1932]).  Right margin: copyright stamp of the publisher, Watanabe of Tokyo.  Blocks, about 20; superimposed printings, about 25; edition, 200.

Recarved or Original Blocks?

Source: Shin hanga.net website article by Thomas Crossland and Andreas Grund http://shinhanga.net/Arecarved.htm
Here's another shin hanga print with some apparently recarved blocks, this one published by Watanabe. "Evening Rain at Ueno Yanaka Pagoda" is a popular Shiro Kasamatsu print, first published prewar. The two versions shown below (without date block in the margin) are postwar, bearing the 6 mm Watanabe seal. Compare the umbrella - the ochre stripe around the umbrella, and the woman's hands. Other differences also seem to be present, on close examination.