Moonlit Night at Osaka Castle (Early Edition)

Description

The current print is from a very rare Tsuchiya Koitsu design. It comes in two variants, a blue one, to which the current print belongs, and a more yellow-toned one. It depicts Osaka Castle, much as it can be found today, on a moonlit night. There is a somewhat similar design by Koitsu, published one year later by Doi Sadaichi, namely Nijo Castle at Kyoto. Even if it depicts a different castle, and is in Mitsugiri format instead of Oban, as is the case with the current print, the composition has some similarities: the viewing angle, the trees in the foreground, the clouds, and the position of the moon. That one was reprinted relatively often post-war, and a later edition can be found here. The current design was never reprinted after the war, however, and due to its rarity, is believed to have only been published in a small first edition.