Exhibitions

Hokusai’s Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji Remixed

2024.04.19(Fri) - 2024.05.21(Tue)

Overview

The Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji is arguably Katsushika Hokusai’s best work of landscape woodcuts, portraying the magnificence of Mount Fuji from various angles as well as depicting people, full of life, at each location.
The aesthetics and unique compositions of his pictures stirred a sensation even among European artists, such as Claude Monet and Paul Cézanne .
The most famous print of all is The Great Wave, depicting the offshore of Kanagawa with the impressive wave design. French composer Claude Debussy was so impressed that he adopted the wave on the original edition of his composition La Mer.
The exhibition combines this great work with super-high-definition digital images, forming an original visual project created by the technical team of the museum.
The remix aspect also covers the landscapes in a photographic form, as seen today, offering another fascinating point of reference to Hokusai’s sketching voyage.
Discover a new, digitally inspired perspective on Hokusai’s Mount Fuji series, which never ceases to entice the viewers 190 years after its initial publication.

Highlights

1. A complete set on display

The series initially contained 36 compositions, then 10 more designs were added following its considerable commercial success. The curation covers the whole set of 46 prints.

2. Printing techniques viewed with a digital eye

The Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji is projected on a giant screen, offering an immersive experience for appreciating minute details such as the paper textures and subtle printing techniques, thanks to the super-high-definition imagery technology with a 150M pixel camera.

3. Time trip through digital landscapes

The Edo-period portrayal of the landscapes around Fuji is accompanied by digital images of the same locations, revisited by the museum production team. Some keep the resemblance of the bygone age while others present stark contrasts between old and modern.

The Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji

This series of woodblock prints was published in c. 1831 by a prominent printer and publisher, Nishimura Eijudō. Hokusai had a great success with this work partly due to the popular interest in traveling and the veneration of Mount Fuji which was thriving at the time. The printing went on for over several years. Initially, a complete set had 36 prints. It is believed, however, that 10 more designs were added later in response to the high acclaim it garnered. His creative compositions cleverly incorporate geometrical shapes, integrating Mount Fuji into the view. The mountain shows different expressions according to varying angles, seasons and lights. Another particularity is his ingenious use of the deep-blue pigment—a rare, imported cobalt blue. Hokusai already developed a portfolio of many images of landmarks and scenic landscapes, but this series became a cornerstone in his career, establishing landscape woodblock printing as a recognized genre of ukiyo-e.

The Artist

Katsushika Hokusai was born in 1760 in an eastern district of Edo, Honjo Warigesui. As a young man, he became a carver at a printmaking studio. Aspiring to be a painter, he joined the atelier of Katsukawa Shunshō (1726–1792) in 1778. Following the death of his master, Hokusai moved on and explored different schools of painting, including the Kanō, Tosa, and Rinpa—he even studied Western paintings. During his career, he changed his pseudonym numerous times. Apart from Hokusai, he called himself Taito, Iitsu, and Manji, to name but a few. Renaming was in a way a sign of attaining a new style of expression. He remained active throughout the 90 years of his life, producing many legendary woodcuts and literary illustrations, including his sketch compilations Hokusai Manga.

EXHIBITION HIGHLIGHTS

神奈川沖浪裏
Under the Wave Off Kanagawa

山下白雨
Thunderstorm Beneath the Summit

尾州不二見原

Fujimigahara in Owari Province

甲州石班澤
Kajikazawa in Kai Province

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