View of the Yokohama Pleasure Quarters of Kanagawa at Cherry Blossom Time

This triptych of woodblock prints by Utagawa Sadahide, dated to the second month of 1860 and held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art (accession number 2007.49.108a-c), depicts the Yokohama pleasure quarters at cherry blossom time. Each of the three sheets measures roughly 37.5 by 25.1 cm, and together they form a sweeping panoramic view of the Miyozaki yūkaku — the licensed pleasure quarter that was established in Yokohama soon after the port's opening to provide entertainment for foreign visitors and Japanese residents alike. Sadahide depicts the quarter under cherry blossoms, populating the scene with courtesans in Japanese dress, Western visitors, and the elaborate architecture of the tea houses and entertainment establishments. The composition draws on the long Edo tradition of pleasure-quarter prints (associated above all with the Yoshiwara of Edo) and adapts it to the new Yokohama setting, where the encounter between foreigners and Japanese pleasure culture had immediately become an object of curiosity and commentary. The cherry-blossom setting links the print to the Japanese tradition of seasonal celebration while documenting a wholly new social phenomenon — the foreign-frequented pleasure quarter — that had emerged only in the months immediately preceding the print's publication. The triptych is part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's major holding of Sadahide's Yokohama work.