Valleys and Peaks: Kanmuri Matsujiro and Hokari Misuo, introducing the photography of Kanmuri Matsujiro, one of pre-WWII Japan's most famous mountain climbers, known for his exploration of Kurobe Gorge and his alpine travel writing, and Hokari Misuo, who operated one of the first mountain lodges in Japan's Northern Alps and was also famous both for his photography and his research on the Buddhist priest and mountain ascetic Banryu, the first person to climb Yarigatake.

Kanmuri Matsujiro was born in 1883 into a wealthy merchant family in what is now Bunkyo Ward in Tokyo. He first became interested in mountain climbing around 1902. In 1909, at the age of twenty-six, he began his survey of the Japanese Alps. That same year, he was invited by Tsujimura Isuke to join the Japanese Alpine Club.Fascinated by the natural beauty around Kurobe Gorge, he hiked from Tateyama to the main branch of the Kurobe River in 1918. From that start, he carried out many pioneering hikes from his base in secluded Kurobe Gorge and created the photographs and writings about his alpine journeys that have led to his being known as "The Master of Kurobe."

Hokari Misuo was born in 1891, in what is now the city of Matsumoto in Nagano Prefecture, where he grew up familiar with mountains from childhood. He first hiked into Kamikochi in 1907 and first climbed Yarigatake in 1914. Seizing the opportunity created by the opening of hiking trails around Kamikochi and Yarigatake, he decided in 1917 to open a mountain lodge called "Yarisawa-goya.". It was around then that he began to study photography, opened a photographic studio in Matsumoto, and began selling alpine postcards. He also took many exquisite photographs of mountains and other striking landscapes. His pioneering achievements include many beautiful snow-season photographs from the1920s.

Kurobe Gorge and Yarigatake in the Northern Alps: these sublimely beautiful valleys and peaks are ever enthralling. In this exhibition, whose theme is the natural beauty for which Japan is world renowned, we introduce, through original prints and a variety of other materials, the superb work of two masters whose names are forever engraved on the early history of alpine photography in Japan.

*image (left)
© Hokari Misuo