A World of Edo Art
Katsushika Hokusai's (1760–1849) woodblock print The Great Wave Off Kanagawa is one of the most iconic artworks in the world and accordingly, his is the only Edo period artist name most people recognize. While his woodblock prints of landscape and nature are justly renowned, they have long obscured his paintings. Hokusai was trained as an artist by apprenticing at a woodblock print shop as a teenager and began his career making ukiyo-e prints for the mass market. In his thirties, he began producing surimono prints, commissioned by private clients for special occasions, and making paintings—a medium he had studied under a Kanō school artist. Hokusai was fortunate to have been born in the late Edo period, when independent artists could flourish, and he is estimated to have produced tens of thousands of pictures in a wide range of styles and media.
