Hokusai Great Wave

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The Great Wave of Kanagawa by Hokusai is a woodblock print in landscape format. Produced between 1830 and 1833, Great Wave depicts a storm with a large wave (sometimes mistakenly considered a tsunami) about the crash onto three fishing boats, all featured in the shadow of Mt Fuji. Part of the 36 views of Mt Fuji series produced by Hokusai, the Great Wave is one of the most recognizable artworks from Japan.
Basic Principles of Design are evident in the artwork, which is dominated by the curved line of the crashing wave. The movement of the lines drawn on the waves guides your eyes to the crest and then brings it back around to view the poor fishermen being engulfed by the wave. Hokusai used the rule-of-thirds with his composition. The main subject, the giant looming wave, is not front and center but to the left of the image, coming in one third from the left, and the crest one third down from the top which helps minimize clutter. The composition seems to be in a circular shape …show more content…

With the use of whites, blues, and muted browns and no aggressive colors, like reds and oranges, suggests that the artist may want us to feel at peace with the image. The fishermen appear to be resting or praying as they are about to be engulfed by the wave, possibly coming to terms with their demise. Traditional Japanese culture has a lot of connections to the relationship between man in nature. The piece does seem to show an off-balance between both man and nature, showcasing an angry sea thrashing the fishermen around and possibly drowning them. The mountain in the background also sits peacefully in the center of the wave in the foreground. From this Hokusai possibly symbolized that reality for a new enlightened age that many stands against new “mountains”, new dangers that came to swallow them in the seas as the wave appears to be swallowing Mount Fuji as

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