Details

In Jungfrau, Hiroshi Yoshida presents the commanding majesty of one of the Bernese Alps’ most storied peaks with both clarity and reverence. This 1925 woodblock print, drawn from his extensive European travels, reveals Yoshida’s ability to translate the Western sublime into the idiom of Japanese landscape aesthetics. The mountain’s triple massif rises in luminous snowfields and deep violet shadows, its vast shoulders brushed by dawn light and alpine cloud. The scene is devoid of human presence—an intentional evocation of scale and spiritual grandeur.

Yoshida’s treatment of the Alpine terrain is characterized by compositional restraint and tonal subtlety. The contrast between crystalline whites and inky indigos lends the print a quiet energy, while the gradation of blue shadows evokes the immense stillness of snowbound silence. The horizon breathes cool air, and the sky, tinged with pale rose, offers a fleeting warmth that softens the mountain’s austerity. It is a scene shaped not by drama, but by awe.

Connoisseur's Note

Jungfrau is part of Yoshida’s important Europe series, executed in the early years of his independent printmaking career—a period that saw the artist traveling widely and establishing his distinctive approach within the Shin Hanga tradition. Though the subject is Swiss, Yoshida’s vision remains rooted in the Japanese landscape ethos, where mountains are spiritual entities as much as geographic forms. In this respect, Jungfrau resonates with the reverence of Japanese yamato-e and the Zen notion of stillness within the immensity of nature.

The presence of the early large brown jizuri seal confirms this as an early impression, printed under the artist’s supervision in his Tokyo studio. Particularly notable is the delicate bokashi gradation used to suggest cloud and elevation, as well as the expressive contour lines in the glacial ridge, which balance realism with stylization. For collectors, Jungfrau offers an alpine counterpart to Yoshida’s Japanese landscapes: a vision of universal majesty, filtered through the calm discipline of a master printmaker.