Tokyo station

The third Tokyo Station composition continues Onchi's sustained engagement with the Marunouchi terminus, the 1914 brick edifice by Tatsuno Kingo that became a recurring motif in his [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) depictions of modern Tokyo. The subject ties the print to the Shin Tokyo Hyakkei project of 1928-1932 and to the wider effort, after the Kanto earthquake of 1923, to fix the new urban Tokyo in serial print form. Working alone through the entire production sequence — drawing, carving, [baren](/glossary/baren) printing on [washi](/glossary/washi) — the sosaku-hanga artist could refine each iteration of a familiar subject as a separate compositional problem rather than a duplicate impression. This print's specific contribution to the group lies in whichever particular viewpoint and palette Onchi chose for it; collectively, the multiple Tokyo Station prints map the building's shifting presence across the day and across the artist's evolving formal vocabulary, from heavier, more architectural readings to flatter, more sign-like reductions.