Maisaka: View of Imagire - Utagawa Hiroshige

A woodblock print from Hiroshige's Kyōka Tokaido series depicting ferry boats crossing the water at Maisaka station.

This woodblock print belongs to the Kyōka Tokaido series, produced by Utagawa Hiroshige between 1838 and 1840. It depicts Maisaka, which was the thirty-first station along the coastal route connecting Edo and Kyoto. The scene focuses on the Imagire crossing, a point where the Hamana lagoon opened into the sea. Because of the tides and terrain, travellers were required to use ferry boats to navigate this section of the journey. Hiroshige positions the viewer at an elevated angle looking over the water. Two large ferry boats occupy the midground, their white sails catching the wind. The boat in the lower section of the frame carries several passengers and bundles of goods. A boatman at the rear uses a long pole to guide the vessel through the choppy blue water. In the distance, sharp mountain peaks rise against a sky that transitions from pale yellow to a soft orange. The publisher Sanoya Kihei released this series to appeal to a literate urban audience who enjoyed both landscape art and light poetry. The inclusion of the kyōka poem in the upper left suggests a more informal and playful tone compared to Hiroshige's earlier Hoeido edition. The blue tones in the water are achieved using Prussian blue, a synthetic pigment that had recently become affordable for commercial print production in Japan. The mountains in the background are rendered with sharp, jagged outlines that contrast with the fluid curves of the waves. Small pine trees dot the shoreline on the right, providing a sense of scale against the massive peaks. The overall arrangement avoids symmetry, instead using the placement of the boats to balance the weight of the landmasses. This print captures the logistical realities of nineteenth-century Japanese travel while maintaining the aesthetic standards of the ukiyo-e tradition.