Chuo-ku Tourism Association correspondent blog

On June 8, 2017, I visited the Soy Sauce Hall in Nihonbashikoamicho, but after seeing soy sauce from all over the country being displayed in plastic bottles, I left here, and 1-35-7 Nihonbashi Kakigaracho in front of the Royal Park Hotel. Yosanko Hamaguchi, the 10th generation third son of Yamasa soy sauce and a copperplate painter, at the Mizutengu HS Building. It's a soy sauce connection.

　

It is a museum with a hideaway atmosphere because it has been renovated from a space that served as a warehouse for Yamasa soy sauce. The first floor and the basement are the exhibition halls. Was it a soy sauce barrel in the past? Now it's a stylish interior, and the 1st and 2nd floors are connected by spiral stairs. Metropolitan Expressway Route 6 runs nearby, but you can enjoy it in a quiet atmosphere without hearing any noise at all.

　

Address:　1-35-7, Nihonbashikakigaracho, Chuo-ku, Tokyo　

(Currently, under the title of "111 billion light-year tunnel", copperplate prints of Yozo Hamaguchi and works of young artists (Yozo Hamaguchi, Tsunao Okumura, Nerhol, Nanae Mitobe) are on display. It will be held until August 6, 2017.

　

1F Exhibition Hall　　

　

　

Yozo Hamaguchi was born on April 5, 1909 (Meiji 42) in Hiromura, Arita-gun, Wakayama Prefecture. The Hamaguchi family has been the founder of Yamasa soy sauce that claims to be "Gibei" for generations, and Yozo is the third son of the 10th generation Gibei Hamaguchi. At Tokyo Bijutsu School (currently Tokyo University of the Arts), he enrolled in the Sculpture Department, but dropped out of school in two years and traveled to Paris, and from around 1937 (Showa 12) during his stay in Paris, he tried to create a copperplate print technique that draws a pattern directly on a copper plate with a needle, and started writing a step towards a printmaker. Hamaguchi is internationally known as a revivalr of mesotint techniques in the 20th century. Mezotint is one of the copperplate engraving techniques, also known as "Maniel Noir (black technique)" and uses a tool called "Belso" on the surface of the copper plate to make fine points on the whole surface and express subtle black shades. The black land made in this way is carved using tools called "scrapers" and "vanishers" to represent patterns and subtle shades. This technique has been cut off for a long time with the development of photography, but Hamaguchi is known for his revival of this technique and the development of the technique of "color mesotint" in which color plates are repeatedly printed. The photo on the left side below shows the tools used by Hamaguchi, and the right is the press machine used when printing after the plate is completed.

　　

After staying abroad for a long time, I returned to Japan in 1996, and spent several years in Japan until I died in December 2000. The Muse Hamaguchi and Yamasa collections were opened in 1998.

　

Hamaguchi used a lot of small fruits such as grapes, cherries, walnuts, and small animals such as shells and butterflies as motifs for his work, and prefers to use a technique that makes small objects stand out in a screen structure that takes a wide space. Was. Here are some of the works exhibited as a collection. (The photos of these works were provided by the courtesy of Musee Yozo Hamaguchi and Yamasa Collection Hall. Reproduction to other places is prohibited.)

　

Yozo Hamaguchi "14 Cherry" 1966 Color Mezotint 52.3 x 42.4cm

　

Yozo Hamaguchi “Zakuro (print collection“ Hamaguchi's six original color mezzotint ”6 pieces)” 1978 Color Mezotint 11.6 x 11.5cm

Yozo Hamaguchi "Lemon of 1/4" 1976 Color Mezotint 15.5 x 15.3cm

　

Yozo Hamaguchi "Wamelon" 1981 Color mesotint 23.3 x 54.1cm

Muse Yozo Hamaguchi / Yamasa Collection Summer Exhibition:　"11 billion light-year tunnel"

Work:　Yozo Hamaguchi, Tsunao Okumura, Nerhol, Nanae Mitobe

Date: Period from May 20 to August 6, 2017

Opening hours:　Weekdays from 11:00 to 17:00 / Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays from 10:00 to 17:00 (final admission 16:30).

Admission fee:　600 yen for adults / 400 yen for university and high school students / Free for junior high school students and younger

Closed days:　Monday

For more information, please contact the Muse Yozo Hamaguchi / Yamasa Collection.

　　　　Tel 03-3665-0251

(The photos of these works were provided by the courtesy of Musee Yozo Hamaguchi and Yamasa Collection Hall. Reproduction to other places is prohibited.)

 

 

The other day, I heard a lecture by Hiroshi Ozawa, a former director of the Urban History Research Office of the Edo Tokyo Museum and a visiting professor at Shukutoku University's Faculty of Humanities, entitled "Kidai Shoran 200 Years Ago". I thought it would be better to write before the impression of the content of the audit diminished, so I chose it because there were other blogs and stories. Here are some interesting information that you can't get on Wikipedia.

　

In 2000 AD, Japanese picture scrolls were exhibited at the Berlin Orient Museum of Art (now the Berlin National Asian Art Museum) in Germany. It was a picture scroll called "Kyodai Shoran" depicting Nihonbashi Street 200 years ago. It is unknown when this picture scroll went to Germany, but it was one of the collections deposited by Professor and his wife Custell of the Free University of Berlin.

　

After that, the Kidai Shoran returned to Japan in January 2003, and was exhibited for the first time at the Oedo Yaohachicho Exhibition, a special exhibition commemorating the 400th anniversary of the opening of the Edo Tokyo Museum in Tokyo. In January 2006, he returned to the Mitsui Memorial Museum's Hall Memorial special exhibition II "Nihonbashi Emaki Exhibition", and in November 2009, a reproduction picture scroll of Hirodai Shoran began to be displayed on the west side of the concourse (Mitsukoshi side) underground at Mitsukoshimae Station on the Tokyo Metro. Honen I was able to actually see the Kidai Shoran at the special exhibition "Edo and Beijing -18th Century City and Living" of the Edo Tokyo Museum held from February 18 to April 9.

　

The picture scroll of Kidai Shoran depicts the west side of approximately 7 towns (760m) on Nihonbashi-dori (Chuo-dori) from Nihonbashi to Kanda Imagawa Bridge in a bird's-eye view. It depicts 88 stores and people, dogs, horses, cows, monkeys, hawks, and vividly depicts the daily lives of Edo samurai, townspeople, Buddhist monk, and beggars. It describes the cityscape before it was burned down in the second year of culture (1805), the year before the Great Fire of Heitora. The title is "Kidai Shoranten", so it seems that there were other volumes of "ground" and "people". It's one of the three volumes.

　

What was written in the volume of "ground" and "people"? For example, one of the scrolls may have depicted the east side of Nihonbashi Street (opposite Mitsukoshi). If it existed, I would have found detailed information about "Nagasakiya and Holland House, Bell of Time" which I am interested in. Or there seems to be a story that the direction of Kanda at the end of Imagawa Bridge is written. If this is discovered somewhere, it is a great discovery.

　

Dogs, horses, cows, etc. are also written, and you can clearly understand the life of the Edo period.

　

At the end of the Kidai Shoran, a high bill of Nihonbashi is drawn. There are three letters (actuals).

The first is the official document issued by the magistrate in May 1711, Masatokumoto (1711).

*　I want to be a parent and child brothers and couples and other relatives, and I should be able to reach the subordinates. What the masters should do in each direction

*　You must not be overdoing everything, without spending your family business exclusively.

*　To do something that should be harmed or unreasonable;

*　A ban on all kinds of hammering

*　He humbled his argument, and he should not meet him at any young time. It's something that you don't have to put your hands on ...

The second is the prohibition of the Christian sect, and the third is the law concerning guns in 1721.

The contents of the "Odosho" are words that can be used not only in the Edo period but also in the present day. The celebrity II, who is arrested for dragging and exploding, feels painful. Why don't you put a "high bill" in front of the entertainer's house?

　

Reference: Tokyo City Guide Club First Seminar 2017:　200 years ago, Lecturer Shigemori Nihonbashi Hiroshidai Shoran Former Director of Urban History Laboratory, Edo Tokyo Museum, Visiting Professor Hiroshi Ozawa, Faculty of Humanities, Shukutoku University