The Suspension Bridge on the Border of Hida and Etchū Provinces (Hietsu no sakai tsuribashi)

The Suspension Bridge on the Border of Hida and Etchu Provinces (Hietsu no sakai tsuribashi), published around 1834, belongs to Katsushika Hokusai's series Unusual Views of Famous Bridges in Various Provinces (Shokoku meikyo kiran). The remote mountain border between the inland province of Hida and the Japan Sea province of Etchu was crossed by a precarious rope suspension bridge slung between cliffs, and Hokusai treats the subject with the vertiginous drama it deserved. The composition pulls the cliffs into the foreground and silhouettes tiny travellers picking their way across the swaying span, while distant peaks recede in blue-grey bokashi. As a ukiyo-e print, the design pushes Edo ukiyo-e landscape away from the urban famous places of earlier generations toward extreme topographies of the provinces, where labour, faith and danger intersect. Prussian blue defines the sky and ravine, intensifying the contrast with the warm earthen ledges. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London preserves an impression that allows examination of the censor and publisher seals of Eijudo and the carving precision required for the swaying ropes. The series of bridges complements the Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji and the Tour of Waterfalls in revealing Hokusai's interest in how human engineering negotiates the Japanese landscape. The V&A holdings remain a major resource for the study of this remarkable group of designs.