-Personification of nature; the wave seems intent on drowning the figures in the boat -Mount Fuji, a sacred mountain to the Japanese, seems to be one of the waves -The striking design contrasts water and sky with large areas of negative space -Imported color: Prussian blue, which made the print seem unusual and special to contemporaries
--Mount Fuji, the highest mountain in Japan, is known for its symmetrical cone -Mount Fuji is considered a sacred site -In Shintoism, the forces of nature unite as one, as they do in the Hokusai print -This was the first time a landscape was a major theme in Japanese prints
-A part of a series of prints called Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji
Context
--Each woodblock print required the collaboration of a designer, an engraver, a printer, and a publisher. -Conceived of as a commercial opportunity by the publisher, who may have doubled as a book dealer -The publisher determined the theme -The print was designed by an artist on paper, and then an engraver copied the design onto a woodblock -The printer rubs ink onto the block and places paper over the block to make a print -Many colored prints were made by using separate blocks for each color -Prussian blue was highly prized in Japan; acquired through trade with Europe