The Shichiri Ferry Crossing at Atsuta in Owari Province

The Shichiri Ferry Crossing at Atsuta in Owari Province, dated 1852 and preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum, is a landscape print in which Utagawa Hiroshige treats one of the most distinctive segments of the Tōkaidō road. Between Miya station, at Atsuta near present-day Nagoya, and Kuwana on the opposite shore of Ise Bay, travelers were obliged to make a sea crossing of about seven ri—roughly twenty-eight kilometers—on small ferries operated by the post-station authorities. This famous "Shichiri no watashi" was already a staple subject of Edo ukiyo-e: Hiroshige had treated it in his earlier Tōkaidō series, and here he returns to it from a different angle. The composition places loaded passenger boats in the foreground and middle distance, their square sails catching the wind, while the wooded headland of Atsuta and the great torii and shrine roofs of Atsuta Shrine occupy the left edge. Beyond the bay the suggestion of distant mountains closes off the horizon. The palette balances cool blues for the sea and sky with warm browns for hull and sail, and a few touches of red mark passengers' garments. As a landscape print of the early 1850s, the design demonstrates Hiroshige's continuing investment in the topography of the Tōkaidō, here distilled into a single richly composed view of a famous and unusual stage of the journey.