Tsukiji Fish Market

The Tsukiji wholesale market — the central fish auction grounds for Tokyo following the post-1923 earthquake reconstruction — provides the subject. The print likely depicts the activity of the market: vendors, buyers, crates of fish, and the broad sheds that housed the daily auctions. As a modern landmark of the capital, Tsukiji fits within the program of One Hundred Views of Great Tokyo (Dai Tokyo Hyakkei, 1928–1940). Compositions of this type typically deploy a low or oblique vantage to convey crowd density, with figural detail carried by the keyblock and bokashi reserved for atmospheric effects above the activity. Koizumi cut and printed every block himself, sustaining the sosaku-hanga discipline of self-production while engaging the topographic subject matter associated with shin-hanga landscape series. The Tsukiji subject sits beside more traditional views in the series, registering the working modern city alongside its religious and historic sites.