View of Nihonbashi

The opening print of Utagawa Hiroshige's landmark series 'The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tōkaidō', published 1833–1834, which followed the highway that linked Edo (Tokyo) and Kyoto. It depicts Nihonbashi, the bridge that marked the starting point of the road, at sunrise — with a daimyo procession crossing and fishmongers hurrying home with their pre-dawn purchases from the nearby market. The cycle transformed Japanese landscape printmaking and became a central source of the Japonisme that inspired Van Gogh, Monet, and the Impressionists.

Exhibition Venue

Edo-Tokyo Museum

Tokyo, Japan