Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Japanese Print Collection

Renowned for his sensitive and faithful renderings of the Japanese landscape, Utagawa Hiroshige is perhaps best known for his series The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido (1833-1834), which was wildly successful in Japan and in Europe. Its popularity inspired the artist to create more than 20 other series depicting activity along the Tokaido Road. As the main travel and transport artery, the Tokaido connected the military capital, Edo (Tokyo), with the imperial capital, Kyoto. The road had 53 post stations where travelers could rest and replenish supplies.

The paired prints in this exhibition show seven stations from the artist’s first and last series depicting the Tokaido Road. The first, The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido, also known as the Hoeido Tokaido after the publishing house that printed the series, was completed in 1834. In 1855, Hiroshige completed the last set, Pictures of Famous Places of the Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido. This group is also referred to as the Tate-e Tokaido, or the Vertical Tokaido. The shifts in style between the first and last series are evident: in the Hoeido Tokaido, Hiroshige focuses on travelers and their interaction with the landscape, while in the Tate-e Tokaido, the artist presents majestic landscape views in which figures play a secondary role. These differences perhaps reflect the artist’s changing perspective as he aged.

This exhibition is the result of a collaborative effort between Professor Elena Varshavskaya, senior lecturer in the History of Art and Visual Culture Department at RISD, and the students in her Fall 2014 course Japanese Ukiyo-e Prints.

Many of the prints in this exhibition were given to the Museum by Abby Aldrich Rockefeller (1874-1948), a daughter of Rhode Island senator Nelson W. Aldrich and the wife of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. A lifelong supporter of the arts, Mrs. Rockefeller assembled a remarkable collection of Japanese woodblock prints. In all, she donated more than 700 Japanese prints to the RISD Museum. Architect Philip Johnson was commissioned in 1952 by Mrs. Rockefeller’s sons, Nelson and David, and her sister, Lucy Truman Aldrich, to design a room for the continuous exhibition of her Japanese prints at the Museum. Originally located on the east side of this floor, the room has been recreated here to Johnson’s specifications.