This exhibition presents works by the two great nineteenth-century masters of the “Floating World,” Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) and Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), alongside modern prints by Kawase Hasui (1883-1957), a key member of the shin hanga (“new prints”) movement. Hokusai was an innovator who made landscape a bestselling subject for the first time in Japanese prints, while Hiroshige took the ideas of Hokusai and expanded upon them. Hasui reimagined the achievements of his predecessors and developed new subjects and themes in woodblock color print through the mid-1950s, when he was named a Living National Treasure in 1956.
Through a selection of over one hundred extraordinary color woodblock prints by these three masters, the exhibition will take visitors on a journey through the most evocative places in Japan, both real and imaginary. It will also illustrate the art of a country that underwent a huge transformation because of the influence of the West between the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century. The Floating World of Hokusai and Hiroshige will be revealed along with its transformation into the tastes of a society that increasingly aspired to European canons, to which Hasui serves as a testament.
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Image Credits:
Katsushika Hokusai (Japanese, 1760-1849), Under the Wave off Kanagawa (Kanagawa-oki nami-ura), also known as the Great Wave, from the series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (Fugaku sanjūrokkei), about 1830-31 (Tenpō 1-2). Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper. Nellie Parney Carter Collection-Bequest of Nellie Parney Carter. Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Katsushika Hokusai (Japanese, 1760-1849), Fine Wind, Clear Weather (Gaifū kaisei), also known as Red Fuji, from the series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (Fugaku sanjūrokkei), about 1830-1831 (Tenpō 1-2). Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper. Anonymous gift. Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Kawase Hasui (Japanese, 1883-1957), Zōjō-ji Temple in the Snow (Yuki no Zōjō-ji), 1929 (Shōwa 4), December. Woodblock print; ink and color on paper. Gift of L. Aaron Lebowich. Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Utagawa Hiroshige I (Japanese, 1797-1858), The Moon Reflected in the Paddies at Sarashina in Shinano Province (Shinshu Sarashina tagoto no tsuki), 1853 (Kaei 6), 5th month. Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper. William Sturgis Bigelow Collection. Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Utagawa Hiroshige I (Japanese, 1797-1858), Cherry Blossoms at Night on Naka-no-chō in the Yoshiwara (Yoshiwara Naka-no-chō yozakura), from the series Famous Places in the Eastern Capital (Tōto meisho), about 1832-38 (Tenpō 3-9). Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper. Gift of the Estate of Henry Adams. Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
