Vibrant sunset colors suffuse this landscape with warmth and drama, demonstrating Kasamatsu's command of color gradation in the Watanabe workshop tradition. Lifetime editions sell for $800-$2,200. The fugitive nature of certain red and orange pigments means that impressions retaining strong sunset coloring are increasingly valued over faded examples.
The last glow of sunset — the moment Japanese aesthetics calls "sunset glow" or shashu — burns across a landscape reduced to silhouette as the sky transitions from orange to deep blue. Kasamatsu's sunset compositions exploit the dramatic chromatic range of the transitional sky, where the western horizon blazes while the east already darkens toward night. Without a named specific location, the sunset glow becomes universal — any Japanese landscape at this moment shares the same quality of light, the same brevity, the same beauty.
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.
Sunset Glow was created by Shiro Kasamatsu (笠松紫浪).
Sunset Glow uses Bokashi, Nishiki-e, and Moku-hanga, on woodblock print.
Sunset Glow was published by Watanabe Shozaburo.
Sunset Glow depicts landscapes and night scenes.
