Evening Shower at Teradomari (Teradomari no yau), from the series "Souvenirs of Travel, Second Series (Tabi miyage dai nishu)"

Evening Shower at Teradomari is one of Kawase Hasui's earliest masterpieces of rain depiction, created in 1921 as part of his "Souvenirs of Travel, Second Series" published by Watanabe Shozaburo. The print captures a sudden evening rainstorm sweeping across the coastal town of Teradomari in Niigata Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast. Buildings along the waterfront are partially obscured by sheets of driving rain, while the sky darkens dramatically with the approaching storm. The scene conveys the raw power and beauty of a summer squall arriving from the sea.

Teradomari was a small fishing port that Hasui visited during one of his many sketching journeys through rural Japan. These travels were essential to his artistic practice — he would spend weeks or months on the road, filling sketchbooks with observations of landscape, architecture, weather, and light that would later be developed into finished print designs back in Tokyo. The "Souvenirs of Travel" series title directly references this working method, framing the prints as artistic mementos of places experienced firsthand.

The depiction of rain in this print demonstrates the sophisticated woodblock techniques that would become Hasui's hallmark. Fine diagonal lines carved into the block create the visual texture of falling rain, while overprinted washes build up the dark, moisture-laden atmosphere of the storm. The composition balances the geometric forms of the town's architecture against the organic energy of the weather, creating a dynamic tension that sets this print apart from Hasui's typically serene compositions. Evening Shower at Teradomari belongs to the broader Japanese artistic tradition of rain scenes that stretches back through Hiroshige's celebrated "Sudden Shower over Shin-Ohashi Bridge." Hasui's interpretation brings a modern sensibility to this classical theme, using the shin-hanga collaborative process to achieve effects of atmospheric naturalism that push the woodblock medium to its expressive limits.