No wealthy patron ordered The Great Wave off Kanagawa. Hokusai made it for a print shop, cheap and mass-produced for travelers - never meant to hang in a museum. Now it's in the Rijksmuseum. What did you think it was made for?
alt text
A Japanese woodblock print by Katsushika Hokusai showing a massive cresting wave with clawing dark blue and white foam tips in the upper left, curling over three long, low fishing boats packed with huddled rowers caught beneath its crest. In the distance, small and pale under a grey sky, Mount Fuji rises between the wave's foam and a second smaller cresting wave on the right side of the image. A vertical text cartouche with Japanese characters appears in the upper left corner of the print, and a signature i