Japanese Woodblock Print, 1916, published by Kanao Bunendo, Tokyo; full title is Rokkozan. Four climbers walking the bath to the mountain.

SIZE IN INCHES: aiban, 9.5 x 13.75 inches

COMMENTS: Number 18 from the most famous and ambitous work of the "sketch-tour books" popular in Japan in the early twentieth century. The series includes 30 large-format prints of views of places around Osaka and Kobe. The blocks and all copies in storage at the publisher were destroyed in the great Kanto earthquake of 1923.

AKAMATSU RINSAKU (1878-1953) was born in Tsuyama City in Oka-yama Prefecture and studied Western-style painting under Yamauchi Gusen at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. He began his career as an illustrator with the Osaka 'Asahi Shinbun' newspaper, where he knew the other artists contributing to 'Hanshin meisho zue', and became a close associate of its publisher Kanao Tanejiro (professional name Bunendo). His designs for the covers of the portfolios for this series are also in the British Museum's collections. He taught at several art schools in the city and became an influential figure in its artistic life, acting as secretary of the Osaka Art Association. He was best known as a cartoonist and recorder of everyday life in newspapers. The British Museum collection also includes a portfolio of prints of nudes from his drawings, published by Bunendo in 1940.

VG, flaws as shown