ITO TAKASHI (1894-1982)
Mount Myoko or Myoko-san (2, 454 m - 8, 051ft)
Japan
In Myokosan at dawn, print on paper, Private collection
The Mountain
Mount Myōkō (2, 454 m - 8, 051ft) or Myōkō-san (妙高山) is an active stratovolcano in Honshu, Japan. It is situated at the southwest of Myōkō city, Niigata Prefecture, and a part of Joshinetsu Kogen National Park. Mount Myōkō is listed as one of 100 Famous Japanese Mountains, and together with Mount Yahiko, it is well known as the "famous mountain" of Niigata Prefecture.
Echigofuji (越後富士) is another name given to this mountain. Being close to the border with Nagano Prefecture, it is linked to those on the Nagano side as one of the Five Peaks in Hokushin. The mountain was originally named Mount Koshinonaka koshinonakayama) but was later changed to Mount Myōkō or Myōkōsan.
Mount Myōkō was formed beginning about 300,000 years ago, in a series of eruptions producing a broad spectrum of lava types including basalt, andesite, and dacite. Its maximum height is estimated to have been between 2,800 metres (9,200 ft) and 2,900 metres (9,500 ft), but it presently reaches only 2,454 metres (8,051 ft). Around 19,000 years ago, the top was blown off in a major eruption, forming a 3 km (2 mi) wide caldera. About 6,000 years ago, the central crater developed and assumed its present shape. A lava dome forms the volcano's present summit. The most recent eruptions about 4,300 years ago produced pyroclastic flows down the eastern flanks. Present activity is solfataric from fumaroles near the lava dome, where sulfur was once mined.
There are onsen and ski resorts at the foot of the mountain, including Akakura, Suginohara and Ikenotaira.
The mountain appears invariably in school songs of elementary and middle schools in the Jōetsu Region.
The artist
Mount Myōkō (2, 454 m - 8, 051ft) or Myōkō-san (妙高山) is an active stratovolcano in Honshu, Japan. It is situated at the southwest of Myōkō city, Niigata Prefecture, and a part of Joshinetsu Kogen National Park. Mount Myōkō is listed as one of 100 Famous Japanese Mountains, and together with Mount Yahiko, it is well known as the "famous mountain" of Niigata Prefecture.
Echigofuji (越後富士) is another name given to this mountain. Being close to the border with Nagano Prefecture, it is linked to those on the Nagano side as one of the Five Peaks in Hokushin. The mountain was originally named Mount Koshinonaka koshinonakayama) but was later changed to Mount Myōkō or Myōkōsan.
Mount Myōkō was formed beginning about 300,000 years ago, in a series of eruptions producing a broad spectrum of lava types including basalt, andesite, and dacite. Its maximum height is estimated to have been between 2,800 metres (9,200 ft) and 2,900 metres (9,500 ft), but it presently reaches only 2,454 metres (8,051 ft). Around 19,000 years ago, the top was blown off in a major eruption, forming a 3 km (2 mi) wide caldera. About 6,000 years ago, the central crater developed and assumed its present shape. A lava dome forms the volcano's present summit. The most recent eruptions about 4,300 years ago produced pyroclastic flows down the eastern flanks. Present activity is solfataric from fumaroles near the lava dome, where sulfur was once mined.
There are onsen and ski resorts at the foot of the mountain, including Akakura, Suginohara and Ikenotaira.
The mountain appears invariably in school songs of elementary and middle schools in the Jōetsu Region.
The artist
Itō Takashi was born in Kama, Shizuoka Prefecture. He was one of the lesser known landscape artists who designed prints for the shin hanga publisher Watanabe Shōzaburō. Like several other print artists of this period, including Ito Shinsui (1898-1972) and Kawase Hasui (1883-1957), Ito Takashi studied painting under Kaburagi Kiyokata (1878-1973). He graduated from the Kyoto Koto Kogei (Higher Polytechnic) School of Designing where he studied Yoga (Western-style painting) with Totori Eiki (1873-1943), the Koto Kogei Gakko (Kyoto Higher Technical Art School) where he studied Nihonga (traditional Japanese-style painting) with Takeuchi Seihō (1864-1942) and the Tokyo Academy of Fine Arts where he studied Nihonga with painter Yuki Somei (1875-1957). Takashi primarily worked as a painter and started making color woodblock prints in 1922, which he did intermittently throughout the rest of his career. He exhibited paintings at the Teiten. He designed about 85 woodblock prints from the early 1920's through 1965.
Many of Takashi's early woodblock prints were only printed in one or two colors, because he was still experimenting with composition and design. These prints were probably not widely distributed. In 1923, a devastating earthquake struck Tokyo destroying the blocks for Takashi's early prints. However, at least one print, Ferry at Odai, Tokyo, was recarved by Watanabe's craftsmen and reprinted for many years afterward.
Many of Takashi's prints are idealistic images that emphasize the beauty of the unspoiled Japanese landscape. He enjoyed depicting dramatic seasonal and weather phenomena and often used bright, almost surreal colors to emphasize these changes. Occasionally people are part of his designs, but they are always incidental, solitary figures. A typical print, Takegawa River at Dawn, shows man living in harmony with nature. Takashi's prints evoke the Japan of old and represent the height of romantic shin hanga landscapes.
Watanabe describes Ito as an artist who experimented frequently with printing and overprinting, and that he also carved one design himself entitled Sinking Sun which illustrated the courtyard of Tokyo Imperial University (present-day University of Tokyo.) Sinking Sun was apparently not published by Watanabe and was distributed by Ito to members of the Edo-Picture Appreciation Society. Watanabe also states that at the time of the Great Kanto Earthquake in September 1923 a number of trial prints by Ito, done in conjunction with Watanabe's printers, were in progress. They were subsequently abandoned due to the destruction of his shop premises.