Night Rain at Karasaki, from the series Eight Views of Ōmi

An image of a famous giant pine tree on the grounds of the Karasaki Shrine in Otsu. The straight, vertical lines suggesting the downpour of rain are cleverly paralleled by the posts used to support the extended limbs of the pine. The ink gradation technique called bokashi is used masterfully here, seen in the fade from black to grey in the tree, in the dark sky above, and in the water below. The printer had to apply this by hand to each color block. Hiroshige created over twenty versions of this series of eight prints titled Eight Views of Ōmi.