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| Artist: | Asano Takeji — 浅野竹二 |
| Title: | Rain at Sanjo Ohashi — 三条大橋の雨 |
| Series: | Famous Places in Kyoto, Continued — 京洛名所続編 |
| Date of first edition?: | 1955 |
| Publisher (first edition)?: | Self |
| Publisher (this edition)?: | Self |
| Medium (first edition): | Woodblock |
| Medium (this edition): | Woodblock |
| Format (first edition): | Shikishi
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| Format (this edition): | Shikishi |
| DB artwork code: | 40775 |
| Notes (first edition)?: |
| I am not sure which series this print is from, but it is dated 1955. |
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| Notes (this edition)?: |
| The following information was taken from the original web listing of this artwork. Note that there may be some inaccuracies:
Monday, 16 July 2007
You are bidding on a very beautiful and rare SELF-CARVED and SELF-PRINTED original Japanese woodblock print “Rain at Sanjo Ohashi (Bridge)” from the Series of “New Kyoto Scenery”(NO!) Signed by the famous Showa Shin Hanga woodblock print master Asano Takeji (1900-1999) made in Showa 30, which is 1955. The print size is 12 x 10 1/4 inches. The colors, which are vivid and vibrant, are in layers. The artist’s signature, his chop mark indicating ARTIST-CARVED and ARTIST-PRINTED, the name of the print, and the publication date Showa 30 (1955) are at the lower left corner of the print. Four borders are intact. Except for a light ink smearing at the very upper left corner tip of the print in the border, which I believe has been there since the print was first made; this woodblock print is IN EXCELLENT CONDITION. |
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| Series Information: |
| Asano completed two series of Famous Places in Kyoto, the second series being titled "Famous Places in Kyoto" and published in 1957/58. |
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| Artist Bio: |
Asano Takeji was born in Kyoto in 1900 and studied art in his youth. He graduated from the Kyoto City School of Fine Arts in 1919 and subsequently from the Kyoto City Specialist School of Painting in 1923. One of his early teachers was the artist and printmaker Tsuchida Bakusen, with whom he studied Japanese-style painting. Asano helped to organise the Kyoto Creative Print Society (Kyoto Sosaku-Hanga Kyokai) in 1929.
In 1930, Asano contributed several designs to a series of prints titled "Creative Prints of Twelve Months in new Kyoto" (Sosaku-hanga shin Kyoto junikagetsu). These prints were published by Uchida. The other artists contributing to this series were Benji Asada and Tomikichiro Tokuriki, also members of the Kyoto Creative Print Society. Asano's work as a shin hanga print designer continued throughout the 1930's, but along the way he learned the skills of carving and printing. This enabled him to create his own self-carved and self-printed series of landscape prints titled "Noted Views in the Kyoto-Osaka Area" (Kinki meisho fukei) in 1947.
During the 1950's, Asano designed numerous landscape prints for the publisher Unsodo. These popular landscape prints are still being reprinted today. Original Unsodo prints have the Japanese date printed in the margin, while the modern reprints lack the date. Inspired by the encouragement of the Lithuanian-American social realism artist Ben Shahn, who once visited him in his studio and remained his friend, Asano established a freer artistic style often featuring animals in bold colours, later in his career. Asano continued to work as a printmaker during the 1970's and 80's. These late prints were simple and often humorous, signed with the letters T.A. and the date.
This information has been excerpted from various web sources and from Merritt and Yamada's Guide to Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: 1900-1975.
浅野 竹二（あさの たけじ、明治33年（1900年）10月24日-平成10年（1998年）2月10日）
京都の日本画家、版画家。京都市立絵画専門学校で日本画を専攻、途中油絵に手をそめましたが、再び日本画に復帰、土田麦僊の率いる「山南塾」に入塾し、国画創作協会展に出品するなど日本画家として活躍しました。 |
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