Mount Fuji at Dawn (Akayuku Fuji)

Date:: c. 1942
Medium:: Color woodblock print; oban
Format:: Oban
Publisher:

Edition:

Published by Watanabe Shozaburo

Source:

Typical Price

Mount Fuji subjects carry steady collector interest driven by the mountain's iconic status — the universal shorthand for Japan in Western collections. Hasui's Fuji views are more varied than Hiroshige's canonical series, often featuring the mountain from unusual lakeside or riverside perspectives. Combined subjects (Fuji with snow, rain, or moonlight) command the highest premiums within this category. Pre-war lifetime editions bearing the Watanabe copyright seal (A through G types, 1926–1944) are the most desirable.

Pre-war lifetime edition (Watanabe seal): $1,200–$4,000
Postwar lifetime edition (J-seal): $500–$1,800
Posthumous/Heisei edition: $200–$700

Description

Mount Fuji at Dawn (Akayuku Fuji), dated circa 1942, depicts Japan's sacred volcano in the red-tinged light of alpenglow — the brief period after sunrise when the mountain's snow-covered summit catches the sun's raking rays and turns the color of molten copper before the light normalizes. Akayuku (literally "reddening") Fuji captures the most dramatic and fleeting atmospheric moment in the mountain's daily cycle, and Hasui's circa 1942 treatment brings his most skilled [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradation technique to the challenge of depicting the graduated color of an alpenglow sky. The red-to-orange-to-gold sky transition demanded the full range of the printmaker's atmospheric craft.