Cloudy Day in Mito, Shôwa period, dated 1946

This 1946 print depicts Mito, the castle town and capital of Ibaraki Prefecture, under overcast skies. Mito is best known for Kairakuen, one of Japan's three celebrated landscape gardens, famous for its plum grove. The 1946 date places this work in the immediate postwar period, a time when Hasui continued printmaking through considerable material hardship. The composition likely depicts the garden, the Senba Lake adjacent to it, or the surrounding townscape beneath heavy cloud cover. Hasui's overcast Mito compositions are known in multiple versions including this woodblock edition, suggesting the subject held particular significance or commercial demand. The soft, diffuse light of an overcast day suits the restrained tonal palette of muted blues and grays, rendered through multiple carefully registered woodblock passes on washi.