Delphi Collected Works of Katsushika Hokusai (Illustrated)

By Peter Russell and Katsushika Hokusai

Hokusai, the Japanese master artist and printmaker of the ukiyo-e school, produced a vast array of artworks, including single-sheet prints of landscapes and actors, hand paintings, individual surimonos, erotic books and many more. His famous print series “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji” marks the summit in the history of the Japanese landscape print, as epitomised by his world famous design ‘The Great Wave off Kanagawa’. Hokusai’s determined industry, spanning over seventy years of continuous creation, serves as the prototype of the single-minded artist, striving to complete his given task in the endless pursuit of perfection. Delphi’s Masters of Art Series presents the world’s first digital e-Art books, allowing readers to explore the works of great artists in comprehensive detail. This volume presents Hokusai’s collected works in beautiful detail, with concise introductions, hundreds of high quality images and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)

* The collected works of Katsushika Hokusai – over 800 prints, fully indexed and arranged in chronological and alphabetical order
* Includes reproductions of rare works
* Features a special ‘Highlights’ section, with concise introductions to the masterpieces, giving valuable contextual information
* Enlarged ‘Detail’ images, allowing you to explore Hokusai’s celebrated works in detail, as featured in traditional art books
* Hundreds of images in colour – highly recommended for viewing on tablets and smart phones or as a valuable reference tool on more conventional eReaders
* Special alphabetical contents table for the prints
* Easily locate the prints you wish to view
* Features a bonus biography by C. J. Holmes – discover Hokusai's artistic and personal life

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CONTENTS:

The Highlights
Segawa Kikunojo III as Oren
Ichikawa Ebizo as Sanzoku
Descending Geese for Bunshichi
One Hundred Ghost Stories in a Haunted House
The Toilet
Sudden Rain at the New Yanagi Bridge, the Rainbow at Otakegura
Sonobe Saemon Yoritane
Hokusai Manga
Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife
A Fisherman’s Family
Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji
The Great Wave off Kanagawa
Fine Wind, Clear Morning
Clear Autumn Weather at Choko
The Amida Falls in the Far Reaches of the Kisokaido
Whaling off the Goto Islands
The Suspension Bridge on the Border of Hida and Etchu Provinces
The Ghost of Kohada Koheiji
Fuji over the Sea
Li Bai Admiring a Waterfall

The Prints
Hokusai’s Prints
Alphabetical List of Prints

The Biography
Hokusai by C. J. Holmes

Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles or to buy the whole Art series as a Super Set

• Language: English
• Publisher: Delphi Classics Ltd
• Release date: Feb 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9781788779876

Book preview

Hokusai

(1760-1849)

Contents

The Highlights

Segawa Kikunojo III as Oren

Ichikawa Ebizo as Sanzoku

Descending Geese for Bunshichi

One Hundred Ghost Stories in a Haunted House

The Toilet

Sudden Rain at the New Yanagi Bridge, the Rainbow at Otakegura

Sonobe Saemon Yoritane

Hokusai Manga

Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife

A Fisherman’s Family

Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji

The Great Wave off Kanagawa

Fine Wind, Clear Morning

Clear Autumn Weather at Choko

The Amida Falls in the Far Reaches of the Kisokaido

Whaling off the Goto Islands

The Suspension Bridge on the Border of Hida and Etchu Provinces

The Ghost of Kohada Koheiji

Fuji over the Sea

Li Bai Admiring a Waterfall

The Prints

Hokusai’s Prints

Alphabetical List of Prints

The Biography

Hokusai by C. J. Holmes

The Delphi Classics Catalogue

© Delphi Classics 2019

Version 1

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Masters of Art Series

Katsushika Hokusai

By Delphi Classics, 2019

COPYRIGHT

Masters of Art - Katsushika Hokusai

First published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by Delphi Classics.

© Delphi Classics, 2019.

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

ISBN: 978 1 78877 987 6

Delphi Classics

is an imprint of

Delphi Publishing Ltd

Hastings, East Sussex

United Kingdom

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The Highlights

Edo, modern day Tokyo — Hokusai’s birthplace

Map of Edo, c. 1840

Nihonbashi in Edo, ukiyo-e print by Hiroshige, c. 1840

A coloured Photochrom of a panorama of Edo, showing daimyo residences, Japan, c. 1866

The Highlights

In this section, a sample of Hokusai’s most celebrated designs is provided, with concise introductions, special ‘detail’ reproductions and additional biographical images.

Segawa Kikunojo III as Oren

The artist now known as Hokusai, the Japanese master artist and printmaker of the ukiyo-e school, is believed to have been born on 31 October 1760 in the Katsushika district of Edo, which today comprises the Tokyo Metropolis. His childhood name was Tokitaro and he was born into an artisan family; his father was Nakajima Ise, a mirror-maker, who produced mirrors for the shogun (the position of Japan’s military dictator, spanning from 1185 to 1868). As his father never made Hokusai an heir, some historians argue that his mother was a concubine. From a very young age Hokusai liked to draw and paint, most likely instructed by his father, whose work included the painting of designs around mirrors.

During his prolific career, Hokusai would adopt the use of at least thirty different names, subsequently thwarting future art historians with the precise dating of works; therefore, many of his prints remain undated. The various different names used by Hokusai at different times in his life have at least provided a reasonable understanding of the artist’s development in his work. Although the multiple use of pseudonyms was a common practice of Japanese artists of the time, his number far exceeds that of any other major Japanese artist. His names are so numerous, in keeping with his constant changes of style, that they are now largely used by critics to divide his work into certain periods.

From the age of twelve, Hokusai was sent to work in a bookshop and lending library — a popular institution in Japanese cities, where reading books made from woodcut blocks was a popular entertainment of the middle and upper classes. At the age of fourteen, he was apprenticed to a wood-carver and began the slow and patient process of mastering this medium. His first task would have been to produce a key block for an artist’s design, comprising the outlines to be printed in black. The wood carver was expected to paste a copy of the design face on to cherry wood blocks, carving through the paper itself. He would then add ‘L’ shaped registration marks to the corners of the block, enabling the sheets of paper to be positioned precisely for the printing. Next a set of monochrome impressions could be printed from the key block, which in turn were used to form the colour blocks. No doubt this challenging and lengthy procedure would endow Hokusai with an enduring appreciation of skilled block carvers – invaluable associates for the ambitious young artist.

When he turned eighteen, Hokusai entered the studio of Katsukawa Shunsho (1726-1793), a Japanese painter and printmaker of the ukiyo-e style, and the leading artist of the Katsukawa school. Shunsho studied under Miyagawa Shunsui, son and student of Miyagawa Choshun, both equally famous and talented ukiyo-e artists. Shunsho is famous today for introducing a new form of yakusha-e, prints depicting Kabuki actors. Ukiyo-e (‘pictures of the Floating World’) were woodblock prints and paintings of female beauties, kabuki actors and sumo wrestlers; these prints also included scenes from history and folk tales, travel landscapes, flora and fauna and erotica. In time, Hokusai would learn to master this style under the tutelage of his master Shunsho, eventually contributing notable works in all of these genres.

After a year of working in Shunsho’s studio, Hokusai’s name changed for the first time, when his master officially called him Shunro. It was under this new name that he published his first set of prints, a series of pictures of Kabuki actors that was published in 1779. Kabuki is a traditional Japanese popular drama, embellished with singing and dancing, and is notable for its highly stylised manner. The art form offers a rich blend of music, dance, mime, spectacular staging and costuming, and it has retained its popularity for almost four centuries. These highly lyrical plays are regarded, with notable exceptions, less as literature than as vehicles for actors to showcase their vast range of skills in visual and vocal performance. Kabuki actors have carried the traditions of Kabuki from one generation to the next, with only slight alterations. Many of them trace their ancestry and performing styles to the earliest Kabuki actors and add a generation number after their names to indicate their place in the long line of actors. Kabuki, like other traditional forms of drama in Japan is still performed today in full-day programs. Unlike the relatively short attendance of modern Western-style theatres, kabuki plays allow audiences to escape from the day-to-day world, devoting a full day to the resplendent entertainment. Though some individual plays, particularly the historical jidaimono, might last an entire day, most were shorter and sequenced with other plays in order to produce a full-day program.

During his early days, Hokusai produced 82 designs of kabuki actors, all structured in the narrow hosoban format — a rare print size, approximately 13 x 6, commonly used in prints of the eighteenth century. These kabuki designs would comprise the majority of Hokusai’s output while employed in Shunsho’s studio.

Completed in 1779, Segawa Kikunojo III as Oren is one of the artist’s first four designs completed for his master. The subject for the print is taken from the play New Tale of Usuyuki, featuring the celebrated female-role Oren, a virtuous heroine. Hokusai portrays the actress Kikunojo standing before a screen, adopting a typical kabuki stylised pose. The depiction of the actress follows the formula developed by the artist’s master for kabuki prints — a single figure is represented in full length, appearing to turn or lean to a side, giving the impression of movement to an otherwise stilted scene. Hokusai projects a sense of depth with the use of a three dimensional stage like floor for the actress to stand upon. The right angled corner of this stage disappears to the left of the print, giving the impression of spontaneity to the narrow image. The inclusion of two partition walls behind the actress further enhance the sense of depth, projecting her figure closer to the viewer.  Her elegant and beautiful dress pools on to the walkway, emphasising the sensuous shape of her slender form. Interestingly, the screen which is depicted to the right of the figure displays a motif of waves crashing against rocks, thus foreshadowing in Hokusai’s earliest days the iconic image that would forever establish his fame across the world.

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

A Kabuki actor by Katsukawa Shunsho, Hokusai’s first master

The July 1858 production of ‘Shibaraku’ (one of the celebrated ‘Eighteen Great Plays’ at the Ichimura-za theatre in Edo. A triptych woodblock print by Utagawa Toyokuni III.

Ichikawa Ebizo as Sanzoku

During his early days in Shunsho’s studio, Hokusai faced great difficulties on several occasions. One legend, passed down by Hokusai’s first biographer Iijima Kyoshin (1841-1901), recalls how the young artist was forbidden the use of the Katsukawa name when Shunsho learned he had been receiving lessons from a Kano school painter. Therefore, Hokusai had to call himself Kusamura Shunro for a time. Yet another legend tells how he fell out with Shunko (1743-1812), Shunsho’s favoured senior student. The story runs that Hokusai had undertaken a commission to produce a shop sign for a small business that traded in books and printed matter in Ryogoku, a district 5 miles from Edo. Once the project was completed, the shop manager was so delighted with Hokusai’s work, that he displayed the sign at the entrance to his premises. Yet, when Shunko discovered the commission, he pronounced the work a disgrace to the Katsukawa name and subsequently destroyed the sign. In later years, Hokusai would credit the affair as a source of inspiration, encouraging him to win the name of a great artist.

Nevertheless, this would not prove to be as simple as he had first expected. Positioned as an artist in the lower sphere of the studio, who was failing to win the good graces of Shunsho, Hokusai received the commissions for design prints of the middle market. Rarely was he trusted with designing woodcuts for important kabuki productions, which were instead reserved for artists of greater experience. Therefore, the majority of his early prints were for off-season performances, printed on cheap paper, while using inferior pigments, with little expectation for their execution.

Yet, through his determination and slowly-increasing reputation, Hokusai was able to win more prestigious commissions, including a diptych that commemorated the production of a play titled The Golden Hilt Ornament and Square Swordguard of the Minamoto Family. First performed at the Ichimura theatre in 1791, this play marked the debut of a future star of Kabuki theatre: Ichikawa Ebizo (1741-1806). The two panels of the diptych represent Ebizo as the character Sanzoku on the left and Sakata Hangoro III as a travelling priest on the right. Hokusai’s book Self-Taught Dancing Apprenticeship, published many years later in 1815, provides an insight into the artist’s fascination with depicting movement, fostered by his interest in the theatre and his playful sense of humour. In spite of the narrow conventions of the hosoban format, Hokusai liked to emulate the energy and spectacle of kabuki stage dances in his prints. We can see this interest in movement in the figure of Sanzoku, a villainous bandit in the drama. The colour woodblock print presents the outlaw as an imposing and towering figure. He rests his left foot on a large rock and appears to lean forward, while his left hand swings back in the other direction, firmly grasping his bamboo staff in a powerful pose. This contrast of directions gives the print a sense of dynamism rarely found in other Kabuki prints of the time. The bandit’s face peers nonchalantly forward, undeterred in his steady and frightening gaze.

The accompanying panel is regarded by some experts as one of Hokusai’s most accomplished kabuki prints.  It depicts the actor Sakata Hangoro III, widely regarded for his powerful stage presence in the roles of villains and heroes. The figure is represented standing in a graveyard scene, casting away his disguise of a travelling priest to reveal his identity as Chinzei Hachiro Tametomo, a surviving samurai of the Minamoto clan.  Clutching the skull of a fallen lord to his heart, Tametomo strikes a fierce stage pose, his elongated eyebrows and red-tinged eyes heightening to his foreboding presence.

Left print: Ichikawa Ebizo as Sanzoku

Detail

Detail