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  • in 1639 Japan closed its borders and cut  itself off from the outside world.

  • Foreigners were expelled, western culture was forbidden, and  entering or leaving japan was punishable by death.  

  • It would remain that way for over 200 years. It was  under these circumstances that a quintessentially  

  • Japanese art developed - art for the people - that was consumed on an unprecedented scale.  

  • The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusai was  made around 1830. It was a time when the rest  

  • of the world was becoming industrialized, and the  Japanese were concerned about foreign invasions.  

  • At first sight the Great Wave is simply  an image of a serene and timeless Japan,  

  • but take a closer look and you see that this beautiful wave is about to engulf three boats of terrified fishermen,

  • as mount Fuji and the shores of Japan, recede into the distance. This is an image of Japan, fearful that the sea,

  • which has protected its peaceful isolation for so long will become its downfall.

  • This is an image of Japan facing an uncertain future.

  • The Edo period refers both to the city of Edo, now called Tokyo, and to a time  period.

  • From 1615 to 1868, during which, after  centuries of civil war, the Tokugawa Shogun  

  • or feudal overlords, took over Japan. The shogun believed that Christianity in particular  

  • and other foreign influences were a threat  to the newfound stability of the country

  • And so it cut itself off from the world. Strict social order was imposed:  

  • At the top were the emperor, court nobles and the shoguns, then the population was split  

  • into, first Samurai then Farming peasants then artisans. And finally merchants.

  • Any interaction between the classes was forbidden, and there were strict codes of public behavior for all classes.  

  • Edo by the mid-18th century was the biggest city in the world, with a population of one million.  

  • As the economy boomed, the merchants, once  considered the lowest social class, rose through  

  • the ranks and increasingly could afford luxuries, like education, travel within Japan, books and art.

  • The merchant's search for sensual pleasures became known as "ukiyo" meaning "the floating world".  

  • A culture that developed in the red light district of Edo. It was here that, alongside brothels, you  

  • would find Kabuki theatres, puppet shows, poets and writers. The commercial prints being produced  

  • were mostly famous courtesans and kabuki actors. Like today it was sex and celebrity that sold!

  • Woodblock prints were known as "ukiyo-e" or "pictures  of the floating world" and sold in the thousands.  

  • It was a craze like modern day trading cardsand there was a constant demand for new images

  • new celebrities and new prints to collect. Although  printed by hand, mass production made them highly  

  • profitable for the publishers. The Great Wave was  probably printed at least eight thousand times.  

  • However, it is important to stress that  traditional painting was still considered noble,  

  • and beyond the means of most  merchants, whereas these prints  

  • could be bought for the price of a bowl of noodles, but were still considered  low in social prestige.

  • Despite the highly controlled atmosphere during the Edo period  

  • the arts flourished and ukiyo-e ensured art was no longer restricted only to those of high status.

  • Hokusai was born in 1760 and made his reputation as a teenager, painting portraits of kabuki actors  

  • for woodblock prints. He would later move away from the images of celebrities and focus on landscapes,  

  • and images of the daily life of Japanese peopleThis change of subject was a breakthrough in  

  • both ukiyo-e and in Hokusai's career, and his work became the most sought after in Japan.  

  • Despite a successful professional life he had a fair run of bad luck in his personal life.  

  • Both his wives and two children pre-deceased him and he was struck by lightning at 50.

  • And then he suffered a stroke which meant he had to re-learn how to draw.

  • Reaching the age of 60 in japan is a time to celebrate. Rather than seen as getting old, it is viewed as a time for rebirth.  

  • Hokusai's last decades were in fact when he produced his best and most loved works.

  • As he himself said: "All I have done before the age of seventy is not worth bothering with".

  • And it WAS at the age of 70 when he embarked on his most ambitious project yet: "36 views of mount Fuji".

  • One of which was The Great Wave.

  • Mount fuji was sacred in japan with over 800 shrines dedicated to it. Religious confraternities were known as

  • Fuji-kō or Fuji cults, and for HokusaiMount Fuji was a personal spiritual obsession.  

  • As well as a site of religious pilgrimages, it  was seen as an important symbol of strength and  

  • stability in Japan, still isolated and enveloped  with its own tradition and culture

  • in 36 viewsHokusai shows Mount Fuji as it is seen from the  forest, the village, the lake, the river and the beach.

  • But it was the sea view known as The Great Wave off Kanagawa that would create international interest in Japanese art.

  • Hokusai would become the first ukiyo-e artist to use landscape as the main focus

  • of these mass-produced images. The 36 views  were classic Hokusai: Condensing images to their  

  • purest form, and placing importance on line and color. They feature the ordinary working-class man  

  • within the sacred landscape. A perfect blend of  the physical and the metaphysical.

  • Landscape prints were not nearly as popular as the celebrity prints. But their sales would increase  

  • as travel within Japan increased.

  • By the late 18th century, there was a steady flow of merchants, peddlers, pilgrims  

  • and pleasure seekers heading to Mount Fuji. These people would prove to be an enthusiastic audience  

  • for a new genre of souvenirs: Woodblock prints  showing views of famous places throughout Japan.  

  • In 1829, Prussian blue, a synthetic colour which  had been very expensive, became available at a  

  • low price via China, making it possible to use  in ukiyo-e prints. Hokusai's publisher, always  

  • on the lookout for novel selling points. promptly  commissioned "36 views" in order to exploit this  

  • new innovative colour. The first five prints  in the series, were printed almost entirely  

  • in shades of Prussian blue, with some indigo. Even the outlines which are usually printed in black,  

  • are also in blue. They would be marketed to the  public as "aizuri-e". Compared to previous blues  

  • Prussian blue was more vivid, had greater tonal  range, and most importantly didn't fade.

  • It also  made the prints 'exotic' and therefore desirable to  the general public. By using different saturations  

  • of the same colour, Hokusai, a master of light and  shade, gives us the impressions of the hours before dawn

  • or after dusk, when our eyes can't make  out distinct shades, because of the soft light.  

  • Although Japan's borders were officially closedthe Dutch, who had never tried to push Christianity  

  • were allowed two trading ships per year. This was  just about, the only direct connection between  

  • Japan and Europe at the time. It was how Hokusai  came to see Dutch landscape prints, which would  

  • have a major influence on his work. Western artists  fix the physical position of the viewer whereas in  

  • Japanese landscape painting there is no distinct  point to guide us. The Japanese were inclined to  

  • depict a panoramic view of the scene, perhaps more  like a floating view. Time too is fixed in western art,

  • whereas Japanese art was more fluid, and often  included several time windows.

  • Although Japanese  paintings or "high art" were not confined by strict linear perspective, low brow images like ukio-e  

  • used European perspective as a sort of noveltyand were promoted as "uki-e" or perspective pictures.  

  • Hokusai would put everything he'd learnt about  style, colour, light and technique over six decades  

  • into his "36 views of Mount Fuji" and one of those  views would bring his work international acclaim.   

  • Ironically, this print which in the west is  seen as a characteristically Japanese image,  

  • is in fact a hybrid of Japanese and European ideasThe Great Wave is 25 centimetres by 37 centimetres.  

  • Hokusai experiments with a low horizon, typical  of Dutch landscapes, which gives it an element  

  • of dynamism through the movement of the  wave, which takes up two-thirds of the image.  

  • If we look at earlier Japanese  seascapes we see more of a 'floating view',  

  • the dark shade of Mount Fuji and the brightness of  the snow-covered cap, suggest it is early morning,  

  • with the sun rising from behind the viewer, lighting the peak. The location is off Kanagawa  

  • which is south of Edo or Tokyo. Tossed about in  the waves are three fast boats, which were used  

  • to transport live fish to the markets in EdoHokusai had worked with European perspective  

  • for some time now, and with the Great Wave, he would  take deep perspective to its ultimate conclusion,  

  • with Mount Fuji, the star of the series, AND the  highest point in Japan, dwarfed by this huge wave in the  

  • foreground, whose spray is becoming the  snow falling on Mount Fuji. As the Great Wave  

  • breaks, the same spray creates ominous claw-like  figures. It is the distance of Mount Fuji that  

  • adds a sense of dread, an element of uncertainty  as to whether the fisherman will make it to shore.  

  • An earlier wave print, shows  a wave breaking at the beach  

  • near the island of Enoshima, while another  print, has an enormous wave about to hit a boat.  

  • These previous attempts look fairly lifeless and  static, but the great wave captures perfectly the  

  • energy of the moment BEFORE a huge wave crashes  down onto the fragile boats beneath.

  • The embodiment  of Hokusai's belief, that art has a life of its  own, a life force. In the cartouche is written  

  • the full title "36 views of Mount Fuji Offshore  from Kanagawa beneath the wave."

  • And to the left  of that, is Hokusai's signature, which says "From  the Brush of Hokusai, Changing his Name to litsu".  

  • Hokusai changed his name at least 30 times over  his career. This was common for Japanese artists.  

  • Even though Japan was still closed off, fear of  invasion by sea, was very real. In the waning days  

  • of the Tokugawa shoguns. There was already talk of  foreign incursions into Japan. One theory is that  

  • the uncertainty and danger of Hokusai's sea, reflects  an uncertain Japan, which along with the struggles  

  • of the fishermen, is a sharp contrast to Mount  Fuji. Representing, then and now, the very soul of  

  • Japan itself, solid and unmoving. The Great Wave was  closely tied to the inevitable end of shogun rule,  

  • and therefore Japan's isolation. Hokusai portrays  the sea, over which these European things and ideas  

  • traveled, with stark ambiguity. This is not an  image of timeless serenity, but of instability and uncertainty.

  • Woodblock prints need a teamPublisher, artist, block cutter and printer.  

  • Hokusai hardly ever worked alone. First, a  publisher would commission an image from the artist,

  • who would create a design on thin paper, a block ready drawing.

  • If we look at this  modern recreation of The Great Wave wood blockwe see it is reversed, and then glued to the block.  

  • It is then rubbed down with an instrument  called a "baren". While it is still damp from  

  • the moisture in the glue, the carver will rub  with his fingers, and peel off most of the paper.  

  • Leaving just the lines of the original image on  the surface of the wood block. The original design  

  • would be destroyed in the making of the block. The carver then reproduces the artist's brush lines in wood.

  • Only the best carvers worked on Hokusai  prints, as the detail he expected was extraordinary.

  • Of course this is a print, and it has been carvedbut this looks exactly like the artist's brush strokes,

  • replicated perfectly by the wood block carver. It was carved from a hard wood, like cherry tree,

  • as it needed to withstand hand printing - one  at a time - thousands of times. The first print would  

  • often differ significantly from the later printsas the block wore down, and fine details were lost,  

  • as we see here. Colours too would change over  the print run. Here, the one on the left is  

  • not only a different colour, but also  has a less subtle graduation in colour.  

  • The printer then inks the block.

  • Lays a sheet of paper on top of the inked blockand then uses the "buren" to transfer the ink, on to  

  • the paper. The artist would mark a proof, indicating  where the colours were to go. And a carver then  

  • made a set of colour blocks. One block would be  carved for each colour that was used in the prints.  

  • This printing technique ensures that  every print has a one-off quality.  

  • A closer look, shows us that, the physical labourleaves unique indentations on the surface of  

  • the handmade paper. Behind the simplicity of The  Great Wave is a complicated and delicate process.  

  • A process, that is only possible thanks  to a dedicated team of skilled craftsmen.

  • For Hokusai, Mount Fuji was a talisman of longevity.  

  • He was convinced, he would live to 110, and was  certain that the older he got, the better he became.  

  • He would live to the incredible age of eighty-nineIn a time when the average lifespan was fifty.

  • His energy and vitality never left  him and he never stopped experimenting.  

  • He was producing paintings until his dying dayUnfortunately later in life, he was forced to use  

  • his life savings, to pay off his grandson's  gambling debts, and he would die penniless.

  • Japan's self-imposed isolation came to an endwhen a flotilla of fully armed ships,

  • sailed uninvited into Tokyo harbour on behalf of the US government,

  • and demanded, that the  Japanese begin to trade with the US.

  • Japanese art, which had developed over two  centuries of isolation, was finally revealed  

  • to an astonished world. Bold designs, intense  colours, simple lines, and areas of flat colour,  

  • would influence a whole generation of artists, and precipitate modern art. One artist in particular  

  • would produce a painting, that I believe was  directly inspired by Hokusai's The Great Wave.

  • In my next video, I discuss  "Starry Night" by Vincent van Gogh.

in 1639 Japan closed its borders and cut  itself off from the outside world.

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The Great Wave by Hokusai: Great Art Explained

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    Q San に公開 2023 年 07 月 30 日
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