Fishing Boats with Nets under Ryōgoku Bridge
Original title: Fishing Boats with Nets under Ryōgoku Bridge
kurzbeschreibung
A triptych from the 1790s by Kitagawa Utamaro: fishing boats with nets set out lie beneath the Ryōgoku Bridge in Edo. Printed in ink and color on paper, the work records the everyday life of the city's river as the Japanese color woodblock print captured it.
Description
Boats crowd the foreground, filled with people fishing: some squat or rest, others stand and handle the nets. Their clothing stays in browns and earth tones. Behind them the bridge runs across the full width, densely packed with passers-by and spanned by wooden poles. Muted, earthy colors prevail; the light falls evenly over the picture with no visible shadows, suggesting a daytime scene.
Context
Utamaro ranks among the major ukiyo-e artists of the late eighteenth century, celebrated for his images of women and scenes of daily life. The Ryōgoku Bridge counted as a well-known sight of Edo and was readily taken up in the art of those years. The triptych format allowed the wide, panoramic view of river landscape and urban bustle.
Impact
The evenly distributed brightness and the earthy tones give the image a quiet, everyday mood. Boats in front and the crowd on the bridge stay cleanly separated; from this comes a balanced relationship between near and far.
Technique
Three separate woodblock prints, pulled in ink and color on paper, join into a triptych. The process allowed precise lines and broad, flatly applied colors, characteristic of the Japanese color woodblock print of the Edo period.
AI-generated description text
Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art · Public Domain (CC0 1.0)