Cherry Trees at Kakise, Bungo Province (Bungo Kakise), from the series Selected Views of Japan (Nihon fûkei senshû)

Part of Hasui's series Nihon fukei senshu (Selected Views of Japan), this print depicts the cherry trees at Kakise in Bungo Province — present-day Oita Prefecture in eastern Kyushu — likely showing the trees in full spring bloom beside the Oita River or a local tributary where the landscape opens toward the mountains of the Kuju range. The Nihon fukei senshu series, published by Watanabe Shozaburo in the early 1920s following Hasui's extensive provincial travels, documented landscapes beyond the well-worn Tokyo and Kyoto subjects. The Bungo subject introduces the softer topography of inland Kyushu, where riverside cherry groves frame views of cultivated valleys. Hasui's treatment would balance the soft, irregular forms of the blossoming trees against the harder geometry of riverbank or bridge, in the meisho-e tradition of locating seasonal beauty within a named geographic context.