Morning at Nijubashi (Nijubashi no Asa)

This print depicts Nijubashi, the celebrated double-arched stone bridge at the entrance to the Imperial Palace moat in Tokyo, rendered in the still, cool light of early morning. Hasui positions the bridge so that its reflection in the moat water creates a paired compositional rhythm — the solid arch above and its liquid mirror below — a structure that emphasizes the silence of the hour. The distant treeline of the inner palace grounds dissolves into a pale sky achieved through layered bokashi gradation on washi paper. The subject belongs to a long tradition of meisho-e, or famous-place imagery, that stretches from Hiroshige's Edo period landscapes through the shin-hanga revival Hasui helped define in the twentieth century. Watanabe Shozaburo's atelier employed highly skilled carvers and printers to reproduce Hasui's designs with precision, and the Nijubashi subject in particular exists in multiple editions and states, reflecting its popularity among both domestic and foreign collectors. This impression is the primary recorded version of the Nijubashi no asa design.