Travels with Hiroshige

Andō Hiroshige, Koshimuraya Heisuke (Koshihei), Awa: Whirlpool at Naruto, 1855, 9th month in the year of the Hare

February 23 – May 26, 2019

The Famous Views of the Sixty-odd Provinces is a famous landscape print series by the Japanese artist Utagawa Hiroshige (1797–1858). Created between 1853 and 1856, the series consists of a print of a famous view from each of the sixty-eight provinces of Japan, plus a print of Edo (present-day Tokyo). Though many of Hiroshige's scenes in the Famous Views of the Sixty-odd Provinces have become representative of actual important places, the artist did not create them on location but rather relied heavily on existing guidebooks. With the flourishing tourism industry of late Edo Japan, travel imagery abounded. This exhibition places Hiroshige's Famous Views of the Sixty-odd Provinces in dialogue with the exciting visual culture of travel in the late Edo period (1603–1868) and at the dawn of modern Japan.

Bite-Sized Art Talks

Art and artist questions explained in ninety seconds or less.

How did Hiroshige influence Monet?

How did Hiroshige make his prints?

What makes Hiroshige's “Famous Views” famous?

Related Programs

Thursday, March 21, 2019, 6pm
Master Series Third Thursday: Blending into the Woodwork.
Independent curator Kit Brooks, PhD, discusses Hiroshige's work, Province of Mikawa: Rocks on the Hill of Horaiji. Hosted by the Worcester Art Museum's Members' Council and free with Museum admission.

Presented with support from the Bernard and Louise Palitz Fund and the Amelia and Robert H. Haley Memorial Lecture Fund.

Master Series is sponsored by Abbvie.

Selected Images

Ando Hiroshige, Kozuke: Mount Haruna in the Snow, 1853
Ando Hiroshige, Kozuke: Mount Haruna in the Snow, 1853, woodblock print, John Chandler Bancroft Collection, 1901.59.1419
Ando Hiroshige, Province of Owari: The Tenno Festival at Tsushima, 1853, woodblock print, John Chandler Bancroft Collection, 1901.59.1401
Ando Hiroshige, Wakasa: Fishing Boat Trawling for Sole, 1853
Ando Hiroshige, Wakasa: Fishing Boat Trawling for Sole, 1853, woodblock print, John Chandler Bancroft Collection, 1901.59.1424