Evening Rain in Kawarago (Kawarago no yau)

Date:: 1947
Medium:: Color woodblock print; oban
Format:: Oban
Publisher:: Watanabe Shozaburo
Edition:: Published by Watanabe Shozaburo
Source:: Art Institute of Chicago

Typical Price

Rain combined with night — one of the most atmospheric combinations in Hasui's output. Rainy Evening in Kyoto (Showa era) sold for $5,800 at Sotheby's New York (2023). Rain scenes by Hasui command a 20–40% premium over standard subjects; the additional nocturnal lighting adds further collectible value. The bokashi gradient technique used for rain-soaked skies requires exceptional printing quality to fully appreciate. Postwar lifetime editions (1946–1957) bearing the small 6mm J-seal represent authentic lifetime impressions but from the artist's final decade.

Pre-war lifetime edition (Watanabe seal): $2,000–$7,000
Postwar lifetime edition (J-seal): $800–$2,500
Posthumous/Heisei edition: $300–$800

Description

Evening Rain in Kawarago, published in 1947, depicts the Kawarago district — likely the small rural settlement of Kawarago in Saitama Prefecture west of the Tone River, a farming community in the flat Musashino plain — under evening rainfall. The rural evening rain subject, applied to a modest agricultural village rather than a celebrated scenic site, represents Hasui's capacity to find atmospheric beauty in the unremarkable landscape of the Kanto plain's ordinary countryside. The 1947 postwar date and quiet rural subject carry a sense of quiet recovery.