Naruto Strait in Awa Province 阿波鳴門之風景あわなるとのふうけい

Description

Landscape of Naruto Strait in Awa is a triptych of woodblock prints by Utagawa Hiroshige, an artist famed for his ukiyo-e landscape pictures. In the latter half of the Edo period, peace and the development of transportation networks combined to produce a boom in tourism among regular people. There was also a surge in realistic landscape pictures based on sketches of actual places. These works incorporated Western techniques of perspective and shading into spatial representation. Painters would travel to various place to sketch the scenery before publishing books printed from woodblocks. These books and their sketches would spread far and wide throughout Japan. Hiroshige also used them for many of his works, including this one.
Hiroshige has used several devices to convey the vastness of the Naruto Strait. These include a high horizon line and an aerial perspective; a panoramic format that ranges over three prints; and a sea color that grows fainter as it fades into the distance. With people growing more interested in travel and scenery in the latter half of the Edo period, this work was probably created to meet a demand for realistic depictions of actual places.

Depicted here is Awaji Island, the largest island in the Seto Inland Sea. The famous whirlpools of Naruto Strait are featured prominently in the foreground. These whirlpools visually allude to flowers, so this work forms part of a larger snow, moon, and flower trio by the artist Hiroshige (1797–1858).