Tengui Rock, Autumn in Shiobara (Shiobara no aki (Tenguiwa))

Date:: 1950
Medium:: Color woodblock print
Format:: Oban
Publisher:

Edition:

Published by Watanabe Shozaburo

Source:

Typical Price

Autumn foliage subjects by Hasui are popular but trade at a slight discount to his snow and rain scenes — the seasonal color is inherently pleasing but less technically demanding than atmospheric precipitation effects. Pre-war lifetime editions command the strongest premiums; combined subjects (autumn foliage with rain, twilight, or temple architecture) approach rain and night scene pricing. Postwar lifetime editions (1946–1957) bearing the small 6mm J-seal represent authentic lifetime impressions but from the artist's final decade.

Pre-war lifetime edition (Watanabe seal): $1,000–$3,500
Postwar lifetime edition (J-seal): $400–$1,500
Posthumous/Heisei edition: $200–$600

Description

Tengui Rock in Autumn at Shiobara, published in 1950, depicts the distinctive Tenguiwa (tengu-face rock) formation in the Shiobara hot spring gorge in Tochigi Prefecture — one of the naturally sculpted basalt formations along the Hoki River gorge that give Shiobara its dramatic scenery. The autumn setting brings the maples and birches of the gorge walls into full color, the russet and gold foliage framing the dark, mossy rock face that juts from the cliff. Shiobara was one of Hasui's earliest subjects (he depicted Shiogama here in 1918) and he returned to it decades later to explore its autumn character.