Japanese Art and Kawase Hasui (Winter)
Japanese Art and Kawase Hasui (Winter)
Lee Jay Walker
Modern Tokyo Times
Kawase Hasui (1883–1957) inhabits the luminous world of Shin-hanga (New Prints), a movement that sought renewal through reverence for tradition. Born amid the transformative currents of the Meiji era (1868–1912), Hasui matured artistically during the Taishō and Shōwa periods, quietly refining a visual language that married classical Japanese aesthetics with modern sensibility.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art observes that “Kawase was a leading figure of the early twentieth-century print movement known as Shin-hanga (literally, ‘new prints’), which focused on traditional techniques and subject matter.” Yet Hasui did more than preserve tradition—he reawakened it, infusing familiar landscapes with stillness, melancholy, and grace.
His winter scenes are especially evocative. Snow settles gently on temples, villages, and lonely streets, muting the world into contemplative silence. Though the weather is severe, the atmosphere remains tender and meditative—each print feels like a held breath, a moment suspended between dusk and dawn.
The British Museum notes his formative path: “In 1907 he began studying Western-style art, especially landscape, at the Hakuba-kai (White Horse Society) and took guidance from Okada Saburosuke (1869-1939); subsequently in 1910 he became a pupil of Kaburaki Kiyokata who gave him the art name Hasui, though the greatest influence on his style and palette was the ‘Nihonga’ painter Imamura Shiko (1880-1916).”
Through the prism of Hasui’s art, one can imagine a Japan untouched by industrial excess, unscarred by nationalism, political ideology, war, and violent social upheaval. His landscapes offer refuge—a parallel world where time slows, where lantern light glows softly against falling snow, and where human presence feels humble before nature.
It is therefore fitting that in postwar Japan, the government turned to Hasui’s serene vision—and that of fellow artists—to project soft power abroad. His prints became quiet ambassadors of beauty and peace, reminding the world that even after devastation, gentleness can endure.
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