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Katsushika Hokusai, 'South Wind, Clear Sky' (Gaifū kaisei) ['Red Fuji'], a colour woodblock print

1831/1831

British Museum

British Museum
London, United Kingdom

It is said that when conditions are right in late summer or early autumn, with a wind from the south and a clear sky, the slopes of Fuji can appear dyed red by the rays of the rising sun.

This is the most abstracted composition and yet the most metereologically specific of Hokusai's series. The delicately hovering clouds part to form a halo around the summit veined with sparse remnants of snow. The lower regions are still in shadow and it is only the bare slopes above the tree-line that catch the sun, turning (in this impression) a bright, brick red. The three shades of blue in the sky seem like a mirror-reversal of the three colours on the mountain.

Details

  • Title: Katsushika Hokusai, 'South Wind, Clear Sky' (Gaifū kaisei) ['Red Fuji'], a colour woodblock print
  • Date Created: 1831/1831
  • Physical Dimensions: Height: 26.10cm (Print); Width: 38.20cm (Print); Height: 40.60cm (Mount); Width: 56.00cm (Mount)
  • External Link: British Museum collection online
  • Technique: woodblock
  • Subject: landscape
  • Registration number: 1906,1220,0.525
  • Production place: Published in Edo
  • Producer: Print artist Katsushika Hokusai. Published by Nishimuraya Yohachi
  • Period/culture: Edo Period
  • Material: paper
  • Copyright: Photo: © Trustees of the British Museum
  • Acquisition: Purchased from Morrison, Arthur

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