Late Hokusai: Society, Thought, Technique, Legacy

The publication "Late Hokusai: Thought, Technique, Society" explores the life and works of the renowned Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai through a range of perspectives, including intellectual concerns, technical excellence, cultural interaction, and patronage. It includes essays on Hokusai's intellectual concerns, his techniques, his society, and his legacy, and challenges the idea that stories of Hokusai have been generated solely by his works.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 250 pages
Publication date: 15 July 2023
Publisher: British Museum Press

This publication has been developed from ideas first presented at the international symposium Late Hokusai: thought, technique, society, held at the British Museum in May 2017. The symposium was organized to enable specialists in a range of disciplines relating to early modern Japan to view and consider the critically acclaimed exhibition Hokusai: beyond the Great Wave, then being presented at the British Museum. The exhibition brought together representative works by the artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760−1849) in the various media in which he worked – color woodblock printed, woodblock-printed illustrated books, brush paintings on paper or silk, and brush drawings − that were produced between the age of 61 and his death aged 90. Building on the themes of the exhibition, authors from the UK, Europe, Japan, and the USA have engaged with late Hokusai from a variety of perspectives, both intrinsic and extrinsic to his life and works. Essays have been grouped within the broad categories of ‘thought -- Hokusai's intellectual concerns and the ways his art brought these to life; ‘technique -- how the artist pursued excellence in a wide range of media, within a commercialized art market; and ‘society -- dimensions of cultural interaction and patronage. A fourth section on ‘legacy looks at how stories of Hokusai have been as much generated by 130 years of scholarship, as they have by his works themselves. Challengingly, faked paintings and printed works have both contaminated and supported those stories. This innovative approach provides new insights into the work of one of the world's most celebrated artists and suggests many new avenues for Hokusai research.

Weight: 1342g
Dimension: 210 x 297 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780861592319