The record behind the sheet in your tube: the file we worked from, what we measured, which impression we chose and why, what we are allowed to sell, and the framing dimensions for this sheet.
The sheet you have
- Work
- Utagawa Hiroshige (1797–1858), Ono, Distant View of Mount Daisen in Hōki Province (Hōki, Ono, Daisen enbō), from Famous Places in the Sixty-odd Provinces, 1853
- Object
- Colour woodblock print (nishiki-e), ōban, 33 × 22.2 cm
- Held by
- The Art Institute of Chicago, Frederick W. Gookin Collection
- Accession
- 1939.1504 (AIC object 34356)
- File
- The museum's own IIIF endpoint, 6500 × 9643 px from a native 6528 × 9685
- Crop
- [107, 102, 6401, 9540] → 6294 × 9438 px, ratio 1.4996
- Printed at
- 40 × 50 cm sheet: image 22.20 × 33.29 cm, original size, 1:1 — 720 dpi available
50 × 70 cm sheet: image 39.96 × 59.92 cm, 1.80× — 400 dpi available
Which impression, and why this one
Hiroshige rules the whole sheet with fine diagonal rain, each stroke cut into the block by hand, and behind it Mount Daisen stands flat and grey-blue. It is the least dramatic subject in the series and one of the best: weather, distance and labour in three bands of colour. Chicago's impression has the rain lines still crisp and unbroken, and the greens of the flooded fields have not gone yellow — both of which happen early.
Why the border is wider here
We do not enlarge a line-cut work beyond 1.8×: past that, the lines the cutter made stop reading as cut lines. On the 50 × 70 sheet our usual 8 % border would have meant 1.89×, so the border is opened to 10 % and the print stops at 1.8×. A slightly smaller image on the same sheet, on purpose.
What we measured
The printed block runs 6294 × 9438 px in the museum's file, a ratio of 1.4996 against the catalogued 1.4865 — the width of a hand-trimmed edge. The scale is anchored on the catalogued block width of 22.20 cm.
Record of a correction: on 2 September 2026 an edge audit reported that this crop cut 0.80 mm off the block on the right. Re-measured natively and checked by eye at five-fold magnification, that reading proved to be an artifact — the routine had treated pale printed ground as unprinted paper. A corrective crop was printed for about an hour, carried roughly 0.9 mm of blank paper on the right, and was reverted the same day. The crop above is the original and the correct one.
What we are allowed to sell
The work. Hiroshige died in 1858 and the sheet was published in 1853: public domain in every market we ship to.
The photograph. The Art Institute of Chicago publishes images of public-domain works under Creative Commons Zero, for any purpose including commercial use. Taken from the museum's own endpoint.
What we do not claim. A giclée reproduction printed with pigment inks. Not a woodblock print, and not sold as one.
Framing this sheet
- 40 × 50 cm sheet
- A 40 × 50 cm frame, no mat. Nearest standard 16 × 20 in. Margins 8.90 cm each side, 7.77 above, 8.94 below.
- 50 × 70 cm sheet
- A 50 × 70 cm frame. Nearest standard 20 × 28 in. Margins 5.02 cm each side, 4.69 above, 5.39 below.
- If you mat it
- Go one frame size up and cut the window three millimetres inside the printed image on every side. Do not trim the sheet.
Please measure before you buy or cut. These figures describe the file we print from. Sheets are cut by machine to about a millimetre and frames vary between makers. We replace a print that arrives damaged or wrong; we cannot replace a frame or mat that turns out not to fit.
All records: museartis.com/pages/sheet-records · Questions: info@museartis.com