Fujikawa Tamenobu (fl. 1890-1920) Japanese, Landscape Woodblock Print. Depicts a stark, thin road at night time, with a noble carried by his servants hurrying along towards the right and two travelers on their own hurrying off to the left. Block of kanji upper right, with two red seals middle right. Accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity and an appraisal from Park West Gallery. 

Overall Size: 18 x 22 1/2 in. 

Sight Size: 8 1/2 x 13 in. 

Little is known of the life of the late Meiji Era Japanese artist Fujikawa Tamenobu. Although he is theorized to have been producing individual prints possibly as early as 1890, his only surviving attributed works are from a 1918 series published by the Takamizawa Woodblock Print Company, leading many scholars to believe that the name is a sobriquet or pseudonym adopted by the artist specifically for the creation of that suite. Sixty woodblocks in total were made to illustrate an immensely popular 19th Century Japanese novel by Jippensha Ikku (1765-1831) called Tōkaidōchū Hizakurige, roughly translated to “Shank’s Mare on the Eastern Road.” The story of “Shank’s Mare” follows two friends who travel from town to town along the Eastern Road and their mishaps as they seek to improve their fortune and their station in Japanese society, revealing both good and bad elements of commoners and upper classes alike. Tamenobu, clearly a student of much ukiyo-e woodblock art and of multiple schools, brilliantly weaves the story together with images made in homage to the most popular print series of the past century, The Fifty Three Stations of the Tōkaidō by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), drawing parallels between them to imply a timeless quality to Japan and the countryside linked intrinsically with its populace. Despite being the only extant work of the artist it remains a topic of debate and research today, with many claiming it to be a pivotal development in the genre that would become known as manga, as well as possibly one of the first examples of what would someday be termed “graphic novels.” The company that printed Tamenobu’s work was founded and run by Takamizawa Enji (1870-1927), an artist who worked for much of his career as a restorer and copier of 18th and 19th Century Japanese woodblock prints. Given that Takamizawa would likely have restored and copied many Tōkaidō-themed artworks in the past, it has been posited that he designed the prints himself and used the name Fujikawa Tamenobu to disguise his authorship for some unknown legal or business reasons. Whoever Fujikawa Tamenobu was, he was highly skilled in woodblock printing and deeply knowledgeable about the pictorial history of the Tōkaidō, and his impact on Japanese art throughout the 20th Century is indisputable.

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