About the Artwork
Komagata Embankment is a Japanese woodblock print by Kawase Hasui, created in 1919 during the early years of the shin-hanga movement. Set along the Komagata River in Asakusa, the work depicts a bamboo yard on a summer afternoon, transforming an unremarkable riverside scene into a study of heat, stillness, and seasonal mood.
The composition is dominated by towering stacks of bamboo arranged like a half-opened fan, their vertical lines forming a dense green screen across the picture plane. In the foreground, a horse stands motionless, its head lowered, while a drayman lies slumped on his wagon, asleep in the heavy air. Through a narrow opening between the bamboo stalks, a wedge of blue water and sky appears in the distance - cool in colour, but unreachable in space. This contrast structures the entire image: enclosure and openness, heat and relief, stasis and escape.
Hasui’s handling of colour and line reinforces the sensory experience of summer. The bamboo absorbs light rather than reflecting it, creating a feeling of weight and humidity. The figures are not animated; they endure. Nothing happens in the scene, and that absence of action is its subject. As Hasui himself noted, it was the listlessness of the horse and the sleeping worker that made the scene feel unmistakably summer-like.
Today, Komagata Embankment resonates as a meditation on pause and bodily fatigue within the city. In contrast to images that celebrate movement or productivity, this print honours inactivity as a natural response to environment. Its modern relevance lies in its attention to physical sensation - the way heat slows thought, bends posture, and suspends time - reminding viewers that stillness, too, is part of urban life.
About the Artist
