Kawase Hasui: The Complete Story
Kawase Hasui, 1883 to 1957, was the last great master of the Japanese woodblock print. He spent his life traveling Japan and turning quiet moments, snow on a shrine, rain on a lake, lamplight at dusk, into some of the most beloved prints of the 20th century.
He carried a centuries old craft into the modern age, and an earthquake nearly ended it. Here is his story.
The last master of the woodblock
Hasui worked in the tradition of the woodcut, the same craft behind Hokusai's Great Wave. A design is cut into wood, inked and pressed by hand, often in many layers of color.
By the 20th century photography and modern life had pushed the old prints aside. Hasui helped bring them back.
What shin hanga was
Hasui was the star of shin hanga, the new prints movement. It revived the classic Japanese woodblock for a modern audience, including Western collectors hungry for Japonisme.
He worked closely with the publisher Watanabe Shozaburo, who organized the carvers and printers. Hasui designed, the workshop produced, a team behind every image.
The earthquake that burned his blocks
In 1923 the Great Kanto earthquake struck Tokyo and a firestorm followed. Hasui lost sketchbooks and printing blocks in the disaster.
He responded by traveling and drawing even more, rebuilding his life's work from the ashes. The loss makes the survival of his images feel hard won.
How to read a Hasui
Look for the weather and the hush. Hasui is the painter of snow, rain, mist and twilight, a quiet landscape with a single small figure or a lit window.
He shows an old, gentle Japan just as the country was modernizing fast. The calm is part nostalgia, part farewell.
Three prints to know him by
First, his snow scenes, like the shrine at Shiba in falling snow, all silence and soft white.
Second, his rain and twilight harbors, where lamplight doubles on wet stone.
Third, his temple and lake views, calm water under a wide evening sky.
The myth of mere nostalgia
It is easy to call shin hanga pretty nostalgia for tourists. That misses the skill and the moment.
Hasui was a master designer recording a country in the act of changing. In 1956 Japan recognized his craft as a national treasure, the year before he died.
Where his prints live
The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds many Hasui prints. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston has a deep Japanese print collection with his work.
A print made by a team
A shin hanga print was teamwork. Hasui drew the design, a carver cut the blocks, a printer pressed the colors in layers, and Watanabe published. One image could take dozens of careful steps.
He designed more than 600 prints over his life. His quiet scenes found fans far from Japan, and the collector Steve Jobs was among the Westerners drawn to shin hanga prints like his.
Kawase Hasui, questions readers ask
When was Kawase Hasui born? In 1883 in Tokyo. He died there in 1957.
What is he famous for? Shin hanga landscape woodblock prints of snow, rain and twilight.
What is shin hanga? A 20th century revival of the Japanese woodblock print for a modern market.
What did the 1923 earthquake destroy? Many of his sketchbooks and printing blocks were lost in the disaster.
Where can I see his work? The Met in New York and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
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