Key value factors: As self-carved and self-printed works, sosaku-hanga value is tied to the artist's reputation and edition size. Larger formats, earlier editions, and historically significant works command the highest prices.
Bridge, printed around 1920, turns Tobari's attention from human performers to engineered structure. The bridge as subject allowed him to explore the formal qualities of repeated structural elements, the rhythm of piers, cables, or arches marching across water. [Sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) artists were frequently drawn to modern infrastructure as a subject that distinguished their work from the traditional landscapes of [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e). Tobari's woodblock renders the bridge with the same directness he applied to his figure studies, the knife carving clean lines that echo the bridge's own functional geometry. The water beneath serves as a field of contrasting texture against the structure's hard edges.
Wakasa Kugushiko
1920
Color woodblock print; oban
Woodblock print
1934
Color woodblock print; oban
n.d.
Woodblock print; ishizuri-e, section of harimaze sheet
Curated cross-cuts that include this print.
Bridge was created by Kogan Tobari (戸張孤雁) in c. 1920.
Bridge depicts landscapes and bridges.
