Detail: For the first time in a decade, the museum will present Katsushika Hokusai’s entire `Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji’ series as well as works depicting Mount Fuji by other artists. This will be an exceptional opportunity to see some of the museum's signature works of art, and the first time in a decade that the complete series has been displayed. Other Hokusai prints reveal his remarkable output and later works inspired by the series that show the central place of Mount Fuji as a symbol of Japan. The exhibition is made up of six sections, putting Hokusai and Mount Fuji into cultural context.
It starts with an introduction to Mount Fuji, and its almost cultlike place in Japanese culture. The section includes painting from the Richard Lane Collection, conserved by the Academy’s Asian Painting Conservation Studio and an extremely rare woodblock-printed map of Mount Fuji that was meant to be cut out and assembled as a three-dimensional model. An overview of Hokusai, which will reveal the development of his style, starts with rare early student works. Hokusai works placed next to a copperplate engraving by 18th-century English artist William Hogarth and a Rembrandt etching will illustrate how Hokusai adapted Western art elements such as perspective. The third section will feature `Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji’ with a special place for the three most famous prints—The Great Wave Off Kanagawa, Mount Fuji in Clear Weather (commonly known as Red Fuji), and Thunderstorm Beneath the Summit.