Okitsu, Suruga Province, Shôwa period, dated 1934

Dated 1934, this Showa-period print of Okitsu in Suruga Province was produced during the mature phase of Hasui's career, after he had established his characteristic approach to coastal landscape subjects. By the mid-1930s his compositions had grown more economical in their use of pictorial elements, allowing individual motifs — a cluster of fishing boats, a pine on the shoreline, the geometry of a sea wall — to carry greater weight. The 1934 date places the print within a period when Hasui worked with publisher Watanabe Shozaburo and later with Doi Hangaten, both of whom maintained high standards for carving and printing quality. The oban format typical of his work accommodates a horizontal coastal view, and the integration of mountain forms from the interior of the Izu Peninsula with the sea surface of Suruga Bay gives depth to what might otherwise be a simple shoreline composition.