Shirakawa-go in the snow

Shirakawa-go in the snow takes as its subject the gassho-zukuri farmhouses of the Shirakawa-go region in Gifu Prefecture, whose steep thatched roofs were designed to shed the heavy mountain snowfalls of the Sea of Japan side. The settlement's distinctive built form made it a frequent subject for [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) artists; Kawase Hasui in the [shin-hanga](/glossary/shin-hanga) register and Saito Kiyoshi in the creative-print register both produced versions, and Kitaoka here joins that lineage. Snow scenes (yuki-e) make particular demands on the woodblock medium: the white of the unprinted [washi](/glossary/washi) must do much of the work, with carved keylines and a few darker blocks defining roof, beam, and shadow. [Bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradations across the sky can suggest overcast winter weather without describing it literally. Compositionally, Kitaoka likely arranges the village's signature triangular roofs in a stacked or terraced arrangement, the geometric repetition of the gassho silhouettes against snow producing a near-abstract pattern that aligns with his interest in structural reduction within recognizable subject matter.