Splendid Old Town
- Medium:
- Woodblock print
- Edition:
- Self-printed
- Source:
- British Museum
Description
A woodblock print depicting a historic townscape with the admiration implied by "splendid," suggesting an older urban area whose traditional architecture retains its beauty and coherence. Takahashi renders the layered rooftops, narrow streets, and aged building materials of a town that has preserved its premodern character against the pressures of twentieth-century development. The subject connects to his documented interest in Kyoto and other Japanese cities where wooden architecture, tile roofs, and human-scale streetscapes survived into the modern era. The mokuhanga technique suits this subject particularly well, as the organic texture of woodblock printing harmonizes with the wooden and earthen materials of traditional Japanese urban construction.
More Prints by Takahashi Rikio
More Urban Scenes Prints
A Hundred Shades of Ink of Edo: Kiyonaga's Pipe (Edo zumi hyaku shoku: Kiyonaga no kiseru)
Woodblock print
View of Kabuki Theater from Matsuya (Ginza Matsuya yori Kabukiza), no. 3 from the series "Pictures of Ginza, First Series (Gashu Ginza dai isshu)"
1928
Color lithograph
Distant View of Mitsukoshi Movie Theater in Shinjuku from the Sixth Floor of Hoteiya (Hoteiya rokkai kara Shinjuku Mitsukoshi Musashi no kan enbo zu), no. 1 from the series "Scenery of Shinjuku (Gashu Shinjuku fukei)"
1930
Color lithograph
Spring Dusk at the Tōshō Shrine in Ueno
1948
Woodblock print, ink and color on paper
Featured in Collections
Curated cross-cuts that include this print.
Frequently Asked Questions
Splendid Old Town was created by Takahashi Rikio (高橋力雄).
Splendid Old Town depicts urban scenes.