Evening at Byodo-in Temple

Hasui was a student of Kiyokata Kaburagi (1878–1973), artistic descendant of the ukiyo-e masters Toyoharu, Kuniyoshi, and Yoshitoshi. He was encouraged by the publisher Watanabe Shozaburo to revive the ukiyo-e tradition in what came to be known as the shin hanga (new print) movement. Hasui combined traditional techniques with Western influence to produce images with a modern feel. He was especially admired for his night, rain, and snow scenes of Japanese temples and shrines.Jerry Wright, a retired designer from Corning Glass Works, was stationed in the Far East with the US Army’s First Cavalry Division in the late 1950s, and occasionally traveled to Japan on business for the Corning corporation. In 2015, he and his wife donated a group of shin hanga woodblock prints they collected in Japan, dating from the 1930s to ’60s. (“American Sojourns and the Collecting of Japanese Art,” curated by Ellen Avril and presented at the Johnson Museum June 25–December 18, 2016)