Japanese painter, embellisher and engraver: Who is Katsushika Hokusai?

Katsushika Hokusai was born in 1760 in Katsushika, one of the important districts of Edo, now known as the capital Tokyo. Six-year-old Tokitarō (Hokusai's childhood name) begins painting around mirrors alongside his mirror-maker father. This craft, which he learned in his art at a young age, is thought to have a formative effect.

He later apprenticed at the library as a clerk, a woodcutter. When Katsukawa, an 18-year-old Ukiyo-e artist, is accepted into Shunshō's studio, he, like his master, focuses more on subjects such as prisoners, everyday events, and Kabuki actors. The first name change happens here, too. Under the name Shunrō given by his master, he published for the first time a series of Kabuki (Japanese folk theater with music and dance) actors in 1779.

Katsushika Hokusai (31 October 1760 – 10 May 1849), known simply as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. He is best known for the woodblock print series Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, which includes the iconic print The Great Wave off Kanagawa. Hokusai was instrumental in developing ukiyo-e from a style of portraiture largely focused on courtesans and actors into a much broader style of art that focused on landscapes, plants, and animals. His works are thought to have had a significant influence on Vincent van Gogh and Claude Monet during the wave of Japonisme, that spread across Europe in the late 19th century.

Ukiyo-e, which also means being modern, is a type of painting that emerged in the Edo period (the period from 1603 to 1868 in Japan). Ukiyo-e, which means Pictures of the Mortal World, is a contemporary painting of its period in which scenes from daily life are also taken as the subject. It draws its subjects from local legends, religion, literature, poetry, stories about the emperor and his family, traditional Japanese theater, and the flow of life. In these pictures, there are mostly short beautiful moments, erotic scenes, prostitutes, geishas, actors, sumo wrestlers, legends, theater actors, etc., freed from the responsibilities of ordinary life. Topics are preferred. At first, monochrome printing was done only with black ink, but after the 18th century, the color printing technique was applied. Although the Ukiyo-e style, which is also used in the interior and covers of old-style hand-painted Japanese books, is usually applied as a print with colored wooden blocks, there are also Ukiyo-e paintings that give the effect of watercolor with a brush in the early periods of the movement.

Hokusai designs toys for his children early in his career. He makes three-dimensional landscape models called dioramas and board games with small landscapes. Diorama is the three-dimensional modeling of a real or fictional event, moment, or story with the help of light plays. After the death of his master Shunshō in 1793, he began to explore European and other art styles, which he saw through copper engravings by French and Dutch artists. He then moves away from the images of actors and actors, which are the traditional subjects of Ukiyo-e. Instead, his work focuses on landscapes and images of the daily life of Japanese people from various social levels. This shift is an important turning point in the careers of Ukiyo-e and Hokusai. His work Fireworks on the Ryōgoku Bridge dates from this period of Hokusai's life.

During this period, Hokusai abandoned the Asian-style two-dimensional perspective understanding and adopted the new perspective technique he saw in Western-style paintings, and began to paint his paintings in accordance with this technique. Hokusai's new painting technique, which is very different from the traditional painting understanding that was repeated before in this remote island country, which is quite close to the outside world, was seen as a revolutionary innovation in Japan of the period, and later as a source of inspiration and recognition of Hokusai in the western art world. played a decisive role in its appearance.

Katsushika Hokusai produces many different types of work, including anthologies, erotica, print albums, hand-painted paintings, and historical novels. By 1800 he further developed the use of the Ukiyo-e for purposes other than portraiture. That year he publishes two collections of landscapes, Famous Landscapes of the East Gate and Edo Scenes of Edo.

Hokusai's work from 1806 to 1815 focuses on a new type of illustrative novel type called Yomihon or reading book. These types of books are mostly novels in which descriptive pictures about historical stories are used. This new style has a very active place in the works of that period. He devotes most of his time to these studies and earns a very good income.

In 1811, at the age of 51, Hokusai changed his name to Taito and entered a new era in his artistic life, known as Hokusai Manga. Hokusai makes thousands of these manga illustrations that are devoted to realism and an accurate depiction of life. This series of drawings, originally made to earn money and attract more students, later enabled the artist to make many formal discoveries. These animated and illustrative patterns also have ironic language.

These paintings make him known as the first great master of manga in Japan and are seen as the debut of Japanese modern manga. When we hear the word manga nowadays, we think of Japanese comics. The meaning of the term manga in Japanese is curious or bizarre drawings. These works, collected under the title of Hokusai Manga, are more like sketches with their simple linear expressions.

Hokusai liked to showcase his artistic talent in public. He used to put on ambitious performances and participate in competitions in public spaces, and at festivals, with his works containing huge pictures of mythological characters on 200 square meters of paper. In the life of Hokusai, who produced most of his works after the age of 60, old age brings him to the top as a rebirth.

In 1820 it changes its name again to Litsu. This name is like a harbinger of his rebirth. Having lost his second wife in 1828, Hokusai suffers several strokes, on top of which he finds himself in a very difficult financial situation due to his grandson's large debts. Hokusai, who is now an old man and has a respected and successful career that has produced thousands of jobs until his age, sets out to work with great determination as if he guessed that these devastating events were his rebirth. In 1830, at the age of 70, he began his famous series of thirty-six paintings depicting Mount Fuji, including the world-famous Kanagawa Wave.

The most important work of the series, in which Fuji, which is considered sacred and the symbol of the country, is depicted from various angles is Kanagawa's Great Wave. The most famous image of Japanese art, this iconic woodblock print features snowy Mount Fuji in the background, the choppy sea in the foreground, three boats caught in the violence of the storm, and the signature in the upper left corner. Two-thirds of the composition is separated from below by the horizon line. As the sea rises and turns, covering part of the sky, it also draws the eye to the mountain on the horizon. The darkness around Fuji indicates early morning and the sun is shining.

As the waves descend into the sea by foaming, they create tension along with a visual delicacy. The raging gigantic wave of 10-12 meters is about to engulf the boats by spiraling. In fact, in boats used to transport fish, eight fishermen each hold oars, while two more passengers are in the front. The small wave in front is similar to the mountain behind; this is a second Fuji silhouette in the waves. The fragility and weakness of human life in the face of an amazing natural phenomenon are noticed in the painting, the original prints of which are distributed to many museums. A poetic display of Hokusai's nuanced mastery and distinctive descriptive ability, the print provides inspiration for Hokusai's art for generations to come. Many artists are inspired by this painting. One of these artists is Vincent Van Gogh. In the Starry Night painting, he is influenced by the Kanagawa Wave. The airflow and color scale in the sky are reminiscent of the flow in Hokusai's Kanagawa Wave.

In the second half of the 19th century, as a result of diplomatic relations between France and Japan, many exhibitions on Japanese art were opened in Paris. Hokusai's three-volume book, 100 Views of Mount Fuji, which he wrote at the age of 75, became a source of inspiration in European art. Impressionists, Symbolists, Nabis, painters such as James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Vincent Van Gogh, Klimt, Cubists, Hokusai as well as other Japanese artists admire the simple works of Utamaro and Hiroshige with intense influence and elegant colors and create collections. Copies made from these paintings are called Japonaiserie. In addition, the Art Nouveau style is heavily inspired by the colorful Japanese prints, porcelain, and furniture of the period.

In 1839, the artist's workshop and many of his works were destroyed in a fire. As Hokusai's popularity declines, young Ando Hiroshige begins to attract attention. “From the age of six, I had an insane passion for drawing the visible shapes of objects,” says Hokusai, who is always on the lookout for better work. By the time I was fifty, I had drawn a world of designs and had them printed, but what I did before I was seventy was not worth bothering with. By the age of seventy-five, I will have learned from examples in nature, animals, plants, trees, birds, fish, and insects. When I'm eighty, you'll see that I'll make real progress. At ninety I will have made my way deep into life's own secrets. I will be an outstanding artist at the age of one hundred. When I'm one hundred and ten years old, everything I create, a dot, a line, will plunge into life like never before. I appeal to you who will live as long as I do, and I will keep my promise. I wrote this in my old age. I've called myself Hokusai until now, but today I'm signing 'Old man who's crazy about painting,'" he explains.

Hokusai died on May 10, 1849. The artist has behind him thirty thousand original prints, paintings, drawings, and books on all kinds of subjects.

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https://www.katsushikahokusai.org/