Utagawa Hiroshige, Tango no Kura (Saddle for the Boys' Festival). Edo period ukiyo-e. Authentic work

This work by Utagawa Hiroshige II is a leaf from Shoshoku gatsu (Illustrated Guide to the Various Trades), presented in a frame. Slightly larger than a postcard, the print is mounted in a simple wooden frame with an acrylic panel. The preface to the volume is dated Bunkyu 3 (1863). The present impression appears to be a later printing, probably dating to the closing years of the Tokugawa shogunate.

Utagawa Hiroshige II was a pupil of Utagawa Hiroshige I. Originally surnamed Suzuki, he later adopted the surname Morita. His personal name was Chinpei, and his art names included Ichiyusai, Ichiryusai, Ryusai, Rissho, and Kisai. Like Hiroshige I, he came from a family of hereditary officers in the shogunate's permanent fire brigade. He entered Hiroshige I's studio during the Koka era (1844-1848), initially working under the artist name Shigenobu. He produced bijinga (pictures of beautiful women), kachoga (bird-and-flower pictures), and musha-e (warrior pictures), subsequently turning to landscapes. His range of subjects thus increasingly approached that of his master. He also produced Yokohama-e (pictures of Yokohama), among other works [1].

Hiroshige I died in Ansei 5 (1858). The following year, Ansei 6 (1859), Shigenobu married his master's adopted daughter, Otatsu, and assumed the name Hiroshige II. Otatsu was then only sixteen or seventeen. In Keio 1 (1865), when she was twenty-two, the couple separated following a quarrel, possibly owing to tensions arising from their twenty-year age difference. He subsequently adopted the surname Morita, moved to Yokohama, and worked under the name Kisai Rissho. There he painted labels for tea chests intended for export, earning the contemporary sobriquet Chabako Hiroshige (Tea-Chest Hiroshige). His work was particularly popular with foreigners. He later moved to Takiyamacho, Shinbashi.

Bishu Nagoya shinkei (True View of Nagoya in Owari Province), from the series Shokoku meisho hyakkei (One Hundred Famous Views in the Various Provinces), was produced in the twelfth month of Ansei 6 (1859). Now in the collection of the Nakagawa-machi Bato Hiroshige Museum of Art, it employs a bold close-up composition to depict a golden shachi roof ornament atop the main keep of Nagoya Castle on a moonlit night. Hiroshige II also contributed to Meisho Edo hyakkei (One Hundred Famous Views of Edo), the series begun by Hiroshige I in his final years. Among its 120 designs, Akasaka Kiribatake uchu yukei (Evening View of the Paulownia Fields at Akasaka in the Rain), in the collection of the University Art Museum, Tokyo University of the Arts, bears the signature "Nisei Hiroshige ga" (Pictured by Hiroshige II). Ichigaya Hachiman (Hachiman Shrine at Ichigaya), Ueno Yamashita (Below Ueno), and Bikuni-bashi setchu (Bikuni Bridge in Snow), bearing censor seals dated to the fourth month of Ansei 6 (1859), are likewise attributed to Hiroshige II. He also produced Yokohama-e and kaika-e (pictures of modernization), signing them Rissho.

Among his original paintings, Yukun zu (Courtesan), executed during the Ansei era (1854-1860) and held by the New Otani Art Museum, is particularly well known. It bears the signature "Shigenobu hitsu" (Painted by Shigenobu) and a square seal reading "Shigenobu" in red relief characters. Following the example of Hiroshige I, the work depicts a beauty in the Utagawa-school manner and also offers a glimpse of the gentle disposition traditionally attributed to the artist.

He died on the seventeenth day of the ninth month of Meiji 2 (1869), aged forty-four. His grave was at Seiganji Temple in Akasaka Hitotsugi. The temple was dissolved in Meiji 10 (1877).