Mount Fuji, Enoshima, Shichirigahama. Let's visit the settings of ukiyo-e and head to Fujisawa!
(Top image) "Pilgrimage to the Island of the River Sagami: A True View of Shichirigahama" by Utagawa Hiroshige. *Owned by the Fujisawa Ukiyo-e Museum, Fujisawa City
A world of art to visit, see and feel
File.13 Fujisawa City Fujisawa Ukiyo-e Museum
Miyuki Inoue (Magcal Editorial Department)
It seems that ukiyo-e prints are booming these days. When you think of landscapes depicted in ukiyo-e prints, you think of Mount Fuji, Enoshima, Kawasaki Daishi, and the Hakone Checkpoint... all of these are in Kanagawa Prefecture! With that in mind, I did some research and found the Fujisawa Ukiyo-e Museum in Fujisawa City.
It's a 5-minute walk from JR Tsujido Station, and admission is free. You have to go!
The area around the north exit of Tsujido Station has been redeveloped and renovated, making the sidewalks wide and easy to walk on. You can easily reach Coco Terrace Shonan, which houses the Ukiyo-e Museum, by passing through a stylish shopping mall and strolling along the street in no time.
First, take the elevator to the 7th floor.
The Fujisawa City Fujisawa Ukiyo-e Museum collects and exhibits ukiyo-e and related materials featuring Fujisawa-juku on the Tokaido and Enoshima. It also apparently has a collection of Enoshima tourist pamphlets from past generations, so in addition to their value as works of art, a major feature of the museum is that you can appreciate the ukiyo-e as local materials for the region.
The current special exhibition is "Scenes of Hiroshige and His Friends: The First, Second, and Third Generations - From Edo to Meiji" (until July 15, 2019).
Utagawa Hiroshige is the author of the famous "Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido." Naturally, he painted many scenes of what is now Fujisawa City, including Fujisawa-juku, Enoshima, and Shichirigahama.
Incidentally, the first Hiroshige was already a man of the late Edo period, so the second and third generations were active during the transition from the Edo period to the Meiji period. It's a little strange to think that ukiyo-e were being produced during such a turbulent time...
Ukiyo-e mainly focuses on people and customs, and it seems that only Hiroshige and his school established the style of what we now think of as "landscape painting" and actively painted it. Ukiyo-e is different from "sketching" that depicts a landscape realistically, but there is a unique charm to works that are said to have been painted after actually visiting the location and burning the scenery into their eyes.
In the video corner, you can watch "Fujisawa Enoshima Ukiyo-e Sightseeing Tour," which visits spots in Fujisawa city depicted in ukiyo-e prints and compares them with the current landscape. The bold deformation is a unique charm of ukiyo-e, and the townscape itself has changed greatly since Hiroshige's time. Even so, when you visit the scenery that served as the setting again, there are some parts that make you think, "I see," and it's interesting.
This is a must-see!
"While people tend to focus on famous artists like Utamaro and Hokusai, there were actually countless ukiyo-e artists active in the same era. Our museum collects ukiyo-e from the perspective of local history, so we hope you will enjoy the wide-ranging world of ukiyo-e, regardless of whether they are famous or unknown."
said curator Masuda Ryosuke.
The facility is compact, so you can take your time to appreciate each piece. Best of all, it's free, so it's great to drop by on your walk.
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The Fujisawa City Art Space is located on the floor below the Ukiyo-e Museum, so we also recommend visiting it!
Currently, the exhibition "Observational Eyes - Living Things and Nature Depicted by Shonan Illustrators" is being held (until June 16th).
The works of these two Shonan-based illustrators are beautiful, cute, funny, a little scary... and very unique. This exhibition is also free to view, so be sure to check it out!
