Utagawa Hiroshige (Japan, 1797-1858) and Keisai Eisen (Japan - Lot 275

Utagawa Hiroshige (Japan, 1797-1858) and Keisai Eisen (Japan, 1790-1848) )Accordion album including seventy prints, oban yoko-e, from the series Kisokaidò rokujùkyù tsugi no uchi, the sixty-nine stations of Kisokaido (complete). Signed Hiroshige ga, plates by Eisen unsigned. Late edition published by Iseya Rihei (Kinjudò). Kiwame censor stamp. (Median fold, wormholes). 23.9 x 36.1 cm This series, dedicated to the Kisokaido, Japan's second most famous road during the Edo period, was created by two emblematic ukiyo-e artists: Utagawa Hiroshige and Keisai Eisen. Hiroshige began the series with publisher Takenouchi Magohachi, but the latter was forced to abandon the project for economic reasons, even though Eisen had already produced a number of plates. Around 1836-1837, Iseya Rihei's young publishing house, Kinjudò, bought Eisen's matrices from Takenouchi and completed the publication of the series with Hiroshige's help in producing new drawings. Provenance: Acquired in Japan by Étienne de Villaret (1854-1931) during his mission (1884 to 1887), then through family descent. Étienne de Villaret, a French officer born in the Lot region in 1854, led a brilliant military career before becoming a Major General during the First World War. Sent to Japan in 1884 as part of a French military mission, he helped modernize the imperial army while exploring the country's culture and traditions with curiosity. During his nearly three-year stay, he built up a remarkable collection of Japanese prints and objects, testifying to his deep interest in Japanese arts and society. His studies, notably Dai Nippon (Le Japon) published in 1889, and his numismatic works published in the Revue numismatique, reveal a scholarly and aesthetic view of a Japan in the throes of transformation. The archives of the Service historique de la Défense and the Japanese catalogs of CiNii (CiNii bibliographic database of works found in Japanese academic libraries) preserve a trace of this particular work, for which Villaret received the Order of the Rising Sun.