Night Snow at Kanbara

The artwork

At night the snow covers houses, trees and mountains, and a few travellers struggle on under the dark sky, bent beneath umbrellas and straw capes. You receive it printed on handmade Amalfi paper, in a handmade frame.

• The white of the snow, the greys of the night and the colour of one umbrella and a few garments.
• A silent winter landscape that brings a sense of stillness to a bedroom or a study.
• A gift for anyone who loves snow and Japanese prints.

It is one of the Fifty-Three Stations of the Tōkaidō, the series that made Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), the best loved landscape artist of Japan, famous, published between 1833 and 1834. The Tōkaidō was the great road that linked Edo, today's Tokyo, with Kyoto, with fifty-three post stations where travellers stopped. Kanbara was one of them, on a stretch of coast with a mild climate, where snow is rare: Hiroshige shows it buried under a night snowfall, a choice of poetry rather than of reportage.

The dark grey of the sky, fading downwards, was obtained by spreading the colour by hand on the woodblock before each printing: that is why every impression is slightly different from the others. Today it is one of the most celebrated prints of the series. Our reproduction comes from the impression in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

In a bedroom or a study it brings the silence of a snowy night. A precious gift for anyone who loves Japan.

Unique quality material

Print on handmade Amalfi paper
Sheet size: 29 x 42 cm (11.4 x 16.5 in)
With frame: 31 x 44 cm (12.2 x 17.3 in)
Material: artwork printed on very fine handmade Amalfi paper with deckled edges
Frame: dark brown with gold fillet, handmade, with glass