WC - Artist Focus (Lesson)

Artist Focus: Katsushika Hokusai

Following in the tradition of Asian landscape watercolor artists, our artist for this module created landscapes based on spiritual sites from his homeland, Japan. Though these works are woodblock prints, each shows the influence of watercolor paintings. These prints will give you a good reference for finding your reference for this module's project. 

Hokusai, Katsushika. Self-Portrait at 83. Pen, 1839. 

Born Into A Family of Artists

Katsushika Hokusai was born on the 23rd day of 9th month of the 10th year of the Hōreki period (October or November 1760) to an artisan family, in the Katsushika district of Edo, Japan. At the age of 12, he was sent by his father to work in a bookshop and lending library, a popular type of institution in Japanese cities, where reading books made from wood-cut blocks was a popular entertainment of the middle and upper classes. At 14, he became an apprentice to a wood-carver, where he worked until the age of 18, whereupon he was accepted into the studio of Katsukawa Shunshō. Shunshō was an artist of ukiyo-e, a style of woodblock prints and paintings that Hokusai would master, and head of the so-called Katsukawa school. Ukiyo-e, as practiced by artists like Shunshō, focused on images of the courtesans and Kabuki actors who were popular in Japan's cities at the time.

Hokusai, Katsushika. Fine Wind, Clear morning. Woodblock print, 1830-32.  

Self-Awareness As An Artist

In the postscript to this work, Hokusai writes: “From around the age of six, I had the habit of sketching from life. I became an artist, and from fifty on began producing works that won some reputation, but nothing I did before the age of seventy was worthy of attention. At seventy-three, I began to grasp the structures of birds and beasts, insects and fish, and of the way plants grow. If I go on trying, I will surely understand them still better by the time I am eighty-six, so that by ninety I will have penetrated to their essential nature. At one hundred, I may well have a positively divine understanding of them, while at one hundred and thirty, forty, or more I will have reached the stage where every dot and every stroke I paint will be alive. May Heaven, that grants long life, give me the chance to prove that this is no lie.

Hokusai, Katsushika. Great Wave off Kanagawa. Woodblock print, 1830.  

Masterpiece Series

Hokusai had a long career, but he produced most of his important work after age 60. His most popular work is the ukiyo-e series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, which was created between 1826 and 1833. It actually consists of 46 prints, a work which "is generally considered the masterpiece among his landscape picture books." His ukiyo-e transformed the art form from a style of portraiture focused on the courtesans and actors popular during the Edo Period in Japan's cities into a much broader style of art that focused on landscapes, plants, and animals.

Hokusai, Katsushika. Tama River in Musashi Province (Bushū Tamagawa). Woodblock print, 1830-32. 

Honoring His Religion in Name and In Art

Both Hokusai’s choice of his artist name and frequent depiction of Mt. Fuji stem from his religious beliefs. The name Hokusai means "North Studio (room)," (北斎) an abbreviation of Hokushinsai (北辰際) or "North Star Studio." Hokusai was a member of the Nichiren sect of Buddhism. For Nichiren followers, the North Star is associated with the deity Myōken (妙見菩薩). Mount Fuji has traditionally been linked with eternal life. This belief can be traced to the The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, where a goddess deposits the elixir of life on the peak. As Henry Smith expounds, "Thus from an early time, Mt. Fuji was seen as the source of the secret of immortality, a tradition that was at the heart of Hokusai's own obsession with the mountain."

Hokusai, Katsushika. The Mitsui Shop on Suruga. Woodblock print, 1830-32.

Beyond the Great Wave

Click HERE Links to an external site. to watch Khan Academy's Beyond the Great Wave Video. 

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