This XXL edition presents the influential Thirty-six Views of Mount Fujide Katsushika Hokusai, a landmark of art history and a masterpiece of woodcut. This visual delight brings together the finest prints from institutions and collections around the world in a comprehensive collection of 46 prints along with 114 chromatic variations, reproduced with the utmost care in Japanese binding. A journey to the heart of 19th century Japan.

The art of Hokusai's woodblock prints

The complete set of views of Mount Fuji

Mount Fuji has long been central to the Japanese cultural imagination, and nothing has depicted it with more virtuosity than the historic series of woodcuts Thirty-six Views of Mount Fujide by Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849). The famous engraver documents 19th-century Japan with exceptional talent and devotion, paying homage to the countryside, the cities, the people and their serene natural beauty. Produced at the height of Hokusai's artistic ambition, the series is a seminal work of ukiyo-e that earned him worldwide recognition as the undisputed master of his craft.
The prints illustrate Hokusai's obsession with Mount Fuji and the flowering of domestic tourism in the late Edo period. Just as the view of the mountain was prized by travellers making their way along the Tōkaidō Road to the capital Edo (present-day Tokyo), so Mount Fuji stands as an unerring backdrop to every scene in the series. Hokusai captures the distinctive landscape and provincial charm of each setting in vivid colour and exquisite detail. The series, which includes the famous print The Great Wave of Kanagawa (also known as The Great Wave), is a treasure trove of international art history cherished around the world.
This XXL edition, one of the few reprints of the entire series, pays homage to Hokusai's striking colours and compositions with unprecedented care and magnitude. Bound in the Japanese tradition of uncut-edged sheets of paper, Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fujire brings together the 36 original prints and 10 others added by the artist himself at a later date. The present volume presents an enchanting picture of pre-industrial Japan and is an impressive monument to the art of woodblock printing.

About the publisher and author

Andreas Marksstudied East Asian art history at the University of Bonn and obtained his PhD in Japanese studies at the University of Leiden with a thesis on 19th-century actor prints. From 2008 to 2013 he was director and chief curator of the Clark Center for Japanese Art at Hanford in California, and since 2013 he has been curator of the Mary Griggs Burke Collection of Japanese and Korean Art and director of the Clark Center for Japanese Art at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.

Publisher: Taschen