Pisa slums

A view of working-class quarters in the Tuscan city, continuing the social subjects that ran through Ono's 1930s prints of Tokyo factory workers and tenements. Where the contemporaneous [shin-hanga](/glossary/shin-hanga) school treated European cities as picturesque tourist destinations centered on cathedrals and squares, Ono's leftist [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) formation predisposed him to attend to the labor districts and unglamorous neighborhoods of the places he visited. The composition likely emphasizes the texture of weathered masonry, narrow alleyways, and shuttered windows, rendered through the high-contrast carving and water-based ink work characteristic of his Tokyo period. Pisa, internationally known for its leaning tower and cathedral, becomes here a site of ordinary inhabitation rather than monument-viewing. The print belongs to a small Italian group within Ono's travel work, alongside multiple impressions of the road to Pompei and other Pisa subjects, suggesting a sustained engagement with the country rather than a single picturesque survey.