''Chie no umi'' (, "The Oceans of Wisdom"
) is a ''chūban yoko-e'' (19 × 25.4 cm) sized woodblock print series by the Japanese artist
Hokusai
, known simply as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. He is best known for the woodblock print series '' Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji'', which includes the iconic print ''The Great W ...
. The ten fishing-themed prints comprise one of Hokusai's rarest sets. Published by
Moriya Jihei, it seems to have been issued around 1832–1834 and publication of the prints ceased abruptly. Some preparatory drawings are extant for prints that were never made.
The prints, which feature scenes of fishing including
shellfish-gathering,
whaling
Whaling is the process of hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that became increasingly important in the Industrial Revolution.
It was practiced as an organized industr ...
and
fly-fishing, allow Hokusai to explore one of his favourite themes, that of man expressing himself through labour and harmoniously working with the forces of nature. This is particularly evident in the print ''Chōshi in Shimōsa Province'', which shows fishing boats struggling in a stormy sea, echoing his roughly contemporaneous ''
The Great Wave off Kanagawa
is a woodblock print by Japanese ''ukiyo-e'' artist Hokusai, created in late 1831 during the Edo period of Japanese history. The print depicts three boats moving through a storm-tossed sea, with a large wave forming a spiral in the centre ...
''.
The series' use of colour differs from other landscape prints of the time. It has richly overprinted shades and an unusual palette of yellow, green and varying red pigments. Hokusai also employs the rare technique of using black for colour and not just line, suggestive of the influence of Western oil painting.
Title
The title of the series can be read in two ways. The characters read as "One Thousand Pictures of the Ocean" (or "One Thousand Pictures of the Sea"),
but when read aloud the title sounds like "Oceans of Wisdom".
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]
Prints
File:Fishing by Torchlight in Kai Province.jpg, ''Fishing by Torchlight in Kai Province'' ( ')
File:Whaling_off_Goto.jpg, ''Whaling off Gotō'' ( ')
File:Fishing at Uraga in Sagami Province.jpg, ''Fishing at Uraga in Sagami Province'' ( ')
File:Choshi_in_the_Simosa_province.jpg, ''Chōshi in Province'' ( ')
File:Katsushika_Hokusai_--_Soshu_Tonegawa_(The_Tonegawa_River_in_Shimosa_Province).jpg, ''The Tonegawa River in Shimōsa Province'' ( ')
File:Basket-fishing in the Kinu River (Kinugawa hachifuse) -- Hokusai.jpg, ''Basket-fishing in the Kinu River'' ( ')
File:Fly-fishing (Kabari-nagashi) -- Hokusai.png, ''Fly-fishing'' ( ')
File:Waiting nets -- Hokusai.jpeg, ''Waiting Nets'' ( ')
File:Fishing_in_the_Miyato_River_--_Hokusai.jpg, ''Fishing in the Miyato River'' ( ')
File:Noboto in Shimosa -- Hokusai.jpg, ''Noboto in Shimōsa Province'' ( ')
Notes
References
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External links
Auction for Soshu Tonegawa at Christie's
{{Authority control
Works by Hokusai
1830s prints
Ships in art