Undated, late 19th or early 20th century Japanese watercolor painting on paper depicting Mount Fuji on the island of Honshu in Japan with various ships / boats in the foreground.
Item has been checked under a jeweler’s loupe. It’s a watercolor, not a Japanese woodblock print. It’s never been out of the framing.
The painting, on white paper, is mounted to a gray-brown paper, which is mounted on paper or paperboard that’s more of a light tan color. It’s under glass. The frame is black.
Painting alone measures a very unique 2 inches by 12 inches. It’s an extreme panorama, showing as much of the wide expanse as I’ve ever seen.
What’s also striking about this piece is that it’s rendered just in varying shades of blue. I can’t say that I’ve ever seen a Japanese painting rendered in this way.
In the broader context of Japanese art and decorative arts, blue works of art were a very ‘in’ thing back in the 1800’s. I think the first works made in this vein were blue and white porcelain called Arita ware that was done with Chinese style landscape designs.
Painters such as Ishikawa Taio and printmakers such as Keisai Eisen began to make ‘blue pictures’ and other items such as fans were made too.
A good read on this is ‘Hokusai and The Blue Revolution in Edo Prints’ by Henry D. Smith II. What seems to have propelled the movement was the popularity of an imported pigment variously called: Berlin blue, Bero, Prussian blue, Hiroshige blue, and (some people called it) Indigo.
The painting offered here was done in Aizuri mode, meaning that the artist only used blue, in several shades. It seems to me that the scholarship on woodblock prints and their artists from this period is great but what about the painters and paintings?
Even though the Edo period ended in 1868 (and the prewar period began), surely there was carryover. I can tell you names of painters like Hashimoto Gaho, Kanzan Shimomura, Yoshida Kasaburo, etc., but actually seeing another blue painting is a horse of a different color (!).
Watercolor on paper, mounted, not matted, floated in frame.
Not examined out of framing. No markings on the front that I can see.
2 x 12 inch painting mounted on 2 3/8 x 12 1/2 inch paper mounted on approx. 4 7/8 x 16 7/8” paper or paperboard.
Measures approx. 5 5/8 x 17 5/8 inches overall with frame.
Good condition. I see some waviness to the watercolor’s paper and the paper it’s mounted on. Frame has some dings, etc., but seems presentable enough.
