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The Great Wave off Kanagawa by the Japanese artist Hokusai is not a single painting but a woodblock print, published around 1831. Carved blocks were inked and pressed onto paper by hand, and an estimated 8,000 copies were made; just over a hundred early ones survive in museums around the world.

Edo (Tokyo), c. 1831

ArtHistory

The story behind the card

Hokusai was about 71 when he made it as the first print of his series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji; the snow-capped mountain sits small behind the wave and three fishing boats. Japanese prints of this kind, called ukiyo-e (“pictures of the floating world”), were a team effort: the artist drew the design, a carver cut a separate woodblock for each colour, a printer inked the blocks and pressed the paper onto them, and a publisher, here Nishimuraya Yohachi, sold them. The deep blue is Prussian blue, a synthetic pigment newly imported from Europe that fades less than traditional indigo. About 1,000 copies were printed at first; as the blocks wore, later impressions lost detail. When Japan opened to the West in the later 19th century, such prints poured into Europe, and in 1905 Claude Debussy asked for the wave on the cover of his orchestral work La Mer.

Türkçe oku
Japon sanatçı Hokusai'nin Kanagawa Açıklarında Büyük Dalga adlı eseri tek bir tablo değil, 1831 dolaylarında yayımlanmış bir tahta baskıdır. Kâğıt, mürekkeplenmiş oyma kalıpların üzerine elle bastırıldı; tahminen 8.000 kopya yapıldı. İlk baskılardan yüzü aşkın örnek bugün dünyanın dört bir yanındaki müzelerdedir.
Edo (Tokyo), 1831 dolayları

Hokusai bu eseri yaklaşık 71 yaşındayken, Fuji Dağı'nın Otuz Altı Manzarası serisinin ilk baskısı olarak yaptı; karlı zirve, dalganın ve üç balıkçı teknesinin ardında küçücük görünür. Eserin Japonca adı Kanagawa Oki Nami Ura, “Kanagawa açıklarında, dalganın altında” demektir. “Yüzen dünyanın resimleri” anlamına gelen ukiyo-e adlı bu Japon baskıları bir ekip işiydi: Sanatçı deseni çizer, oymacı her renk için ayrı bir tahta kalıp keser, baskıcı kalıpları mürekkepleyip kâğıdı üzerlerine bastırır, yayıncı da masrafı karşılayıp baskıları satardı. Bu eserin yayıncısı Nishimuraya Yohachi'ydi. Koyu mavi, Prusya mavisidir: Avrupa'dan yeni gelen bu yapay boya, geleneksel çivitten daha geç solar. İlk baskıda yaklaşık 1.000 kopya basıldı; kalıplar aşındıkça sonraki baskılarda ayrıntılar silikleşti. Japonya 19. yüzyılın ikinci yarısında Batı'ya açılınca bu baskılar Avrupa'ya akın etti. Claude Debussy de 1905'te La Mer (Deniz) adlı orkestra eserinin kapağına bu dalganın konmasını istedi.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: The Great Wave off Kanagawa
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