Category: Weather and the Built Environment

The essays in this section examine representations of weather unfolding in and around the built environment, including houses, bridges, cities, and the Amherst College campus. From Japanese wood-block prints to Pictorialist photographs, these objects speak to the effect of weather on architecture, as well as the importance of architecture in mediating human experiences of weather.

Hiroshige’s Sudden Shower at Ohashi

Author By Julia Zacher '25
Categories: 19th Century, Asia, Mead Art Museum, Print, Rain, Weather and People, Weather and the Built Environment

Woodblock print of a stormy, rainy scene. Travelers walk over a bridge and try to avoid the rain falling.

Hiroshige’s View of Yedo

Author By Olivia Stewart '25
Categories: 19th Century, Asia, Mead Art Museum, Print, Snow, Weather and People, Weather and the Built Environment

Woodblock print of a snowy canal scene in Edo, with figures in traditional clothing standing on a dock as a small boat approaches through falling snow.

Kobayashi Kiyochika’s Outbreak of Fire

Author By Braden Poon '27
Categories: 19th Century, Asia, Mead Art Museum, Print, Weather and Destruction, Weather and the Built Environment, Wind

Orange flames dominate the composition, driven rightward by wind. People flee on the right side of the canal. One of the unburned homes on the right has people on their roof observing.

Sarah Berman’s Rainy Street Scene

Author By Elizabeth Papalia '25
Categories: 20th Century, Mead Art Museum, North America, Painting, Rain, Weather and People, Weather and the Built Environment

Three women in brightly colored clothes and carrying umbrellas navigate a dark city street.

Edward Steichen’s The Flatiron

Author By Dulcie McGrath '28
Categories: 20th Century, Fog, Mead Art Museum, North America, Photograph, Rain, Weather and the Built Environment

A soft-focused, green toned photograph of the Flatiron building in Manhattan, NYC, at twilight. The view is foggy and blocked by a branch.

Satō Shintarō’s Shinkoiwa, Katsushika-ku (Snow)

Author By Harrison Lundy '25
Categories: 21st Century, Asia, Climate, Mead Art Museum, Photograph, Snow, Weather and Culture, Weather and the Built Environment

Dense three and four-story white and yellow buildings fill most of the image in an incongruous pattern, with snow-covered roofs. In the background, several bridges cross a river, and three skyscrapers dot the far skyline under a dark night sky.

Gabriel Cooney’s Photograph of the Campus in Snow

Author By Tyson Luna '25
Categories: 20th Century, Frost Library Archives, North America, Photograph, Snow, Weather and Amherst, Weather and the Built Environment

Fresh snow covers the buildings of the Amherst athletic center, as seen from Memorial Hill.

Hiroshige’s Print of Kambara in the Snow

Author By Peter Kliziwecz '25
Categories: 19th Century, Asia, Mead Art Museum, Print, Snow, Weather and People, Weather and the Built Environment

A snowy nighttime scene. The foreground features one figure resting while two figures trudge through the snow.

Kokan Bannai’s Nihonbashi Bridge in Snow

Author By Sydney Kang '25
Categories: 20th Century, Asia, Mead Art Museum, Print, Snow, Weather and the Built Environment

A landscape of a snowy wooden bridge. Vehicles cross it in view of boats and city buildings.