Rain at Nara, the Pagoda at Kofuku Temple (Nara no ame Kofukuji no to)

Rain at Nara — the Pagoda at Kofuku Temple, published in 1951, depicts the five-story pagoda of Kofuku-ji temple — the iconic silhouette most associated with the Nara cityscape — under rainfall, its stone lanterns and ancient tiers softened by the gray curtain of precipitation. The Kofuku-ji pagoda, built in 730 CE and rebuilt after fire in 1426, is the second-tallest pagoda in Japan, and its distinctive profile against the Nara sky has been a subject for artists for centuries. The rain treatment — with its bokashi sky and wet-stone surfaces — gives the 1951 composition a contemplative, weathered quality suited to one of Japan's oldest monuments.