Collections: Asian Art: Plum Estate, Kameido (Kameido Umeyashiki), No. 30 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo

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Plum Estate, Kameido (Kameido Umeyashiki), No. 30 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo

• Artist: Utagawa Hiroshige (Ando), Japanese, 1797-1858
• Medium: Woodblock print
• Place Made: Japan
• Dates: 11th month of 1857
• Period: Edo Period, Ansei Era
• Dimensions: Sheet: 14 3/16 x 9 1/4 in. (36 x 23.5 cm) Image: 13 3/8 x 8 7/8 in. (34 x 22.6 cm)
• Signature: Hiroshige-a
• Collections: Asian Art
• Museum Location: This item is not on view
• Accession Number: 30.1478.30
• Credit Line: Gift of Anna Ferris
• Image: Overall, 30.1478.30_PS1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph, 2006
Utagawa Hiroshige (Ando) (Japanese, 1797-1858). Plum Estate, Kameido (Kameido Umeyashiki), No. 30 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo, 11th month of 1857. Woodblock print, Sheet: 14 3/16 x 9 1/4 in. (36 x 23.5 cm) Image: 13 3/8 x 8 7/8 in. (34 x 22.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Anna Ferris, 30.1478.30 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 30.1478.30_PS1.jpg)
• Catalogue Description: View of the Kameido plum orchard as seen through the branches of a plum tree. The artist has depicted the scene with a reddish pink sky and green ground. View of the "Sleeping Dragon Plum" (Garyubai), the most famous tree in Edo. The unusual pattern of the tree's growth is seen by the low branches entering the soil and re-emerging at a distance to create new trunks, thus, the tree was constantly rejuvenated and had spread over an area of some 50 feet square. The image of the "sleeping dragon" came from the way the branches looped across the ground. It was surrounded by a low fence to keep people from pressing too near. This print was one of two in the eires (together with pl. 58) that attracted Vincent van Gogh and he painted a copy of this print, in oils, in 1877. There are striking color contrasts between the copy and the original, whereas van Gogh's colors show "passion" and youthfulness, the original with its shading of the gnarled trunks gives a sense of greater age. The "sleeping dragon plum" survived in Kameido until 1910, when it was killed by a great flood.