This series, Fifty-three Pairings of the Tokaido Road, Tōkaidō gojūsan tsui, 東海道五十三対, popularly called Pairs Tōkaidō or 53 Parallels for the Tokaido Road, was published in 1845-1846.
It is a unique cooperation between three artists: Utagawa Hiroshige, Utagawa Kunisada and Utagawa Kuniyoshi and five publishers: Ibaya Kyūbei, (Ibaya Senzaburô (Dansendô)) and Kojimaya Jûbei, Enshûya Matabei, Ebiya Rinnosuke (Kaijudô) and Iseya Ichibei.
The special feature of this "Pairs Tōkaidō" is the pairing of a print for each station with a legend, a wonderful, dramatic, historic or supranatural story. These stories are told partly by the print theme, partly by accompanying text in a cartouche. Sometimes there is a poem. It is a very enjoyable tour!
Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese: 歌川 広重), also called Andō Hiroshige (in Japanese: 安藤 広重;) was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist, considered the last great master of that tradition. He was born 1797 and died 12 October 1858.
Ukiyo-e is a genre of Japanese art which flourished from the 17th through 19th centuries. Its artists produced woodblock prints and paintings of such subjects as female beauties; kabuki actors and sumo wrestlers; scenes from history and folk tales; travel scenes and landscapes; flora and fauna; and erotica. The term ukiyo-e (浮世絵) translates as "picture[s] of the floating world".
Hiroshige is best known for his horizontal-format landscape series
Utagawa Kunisada (歌川 国貞; 1786 - 12 January 1865), also known as Utagawa Toyokuni III (三代 歌川 豊国 Sandai Utagawa Toyokuni), was the most popular, prolific and commercially successful designer of ukiyo-e woodblock prints in 19th-century Japan. In his own time, his reputation in Japan far exceeded that of his contemporaries, Hokusai, Hiroshige and Kuniyoshi. However, he is lesser known in the West. At the end of the Edo period (1603-1867), Hiroshige, Kuniyoshi and Kunisada were the three best representatives of the Japanese color woodcut in Edo (capital city of Japan, now Tokyo).Utagawa Kuniyoshi (歌川 國芳, January 1, 1798 - April 14, 1861) was one of the last great masters of the Japanese ukiyo-e style of woodblock prints and painting. He was a member of the Utagawa school. The range of Kuniyoshi's subjects included many genres: landscapes, beautiful women, Kabuki actors, cats, and mythical animals. He is known for depictions of the battles of legendary samurai heroes.
Kuniyoshi was born on January 1, 1798, the son of a silk-dyer, Yanagiya Kichiyemon, originally named Yoshisaburō. Apparently he assisted his father's business as a pattern designer, and some have suggested that this experience influenced his rich use of color and textile patterns in prints. It is said that Kuniyoshi was impressed, at an early age of seven or eight, by ukiyo-e warrior prints, and by pictures of artisans and commoners (as depicted
