Page 314 - Edo: Art in Japan, 1615–1868

168 life he devoted himself to a Basho The title of the print, the first in
Yosa Buson (1716-1783) restoration movement, advocating a Hokusai's series of Thirty-six Views of
Narrow Road to the Deep North return to that master's poetic values. Mount Fuji, translated literally means
"Kanagawa, Underside of a Breaking
Dated 1778 As part of his homage, Buson began Wave." Because the publisher, Eijudó,
Two handscrolls; ink and light color in 1777 to make numerous illustra- promised that the series would be
on paper tions of Bashó's Narrow Road to the embellished with Prussian blue, it is
l
Each 29 x 711 (n /2 x 280) Deep North. In none of these images logical that Hokusai would choose a
Kyoto National Museum did he reproduce Bashó's entire diary, seascape as the major motif of the
Important Cultural Property but he instead selected and essen- inaugural print. Throughout his career
tially re-presented the work, creating Hokusai was fascinated with the
• Yosa Buson, one of the pillars of the something wholly new and unex- problem of rendering water. He exper-
second-generation literati school, pected by juxtaposing images from imented again and again with aque- 313
was born into a wealthy farming fam- Japanese history with episodes from ous forms, combining movement with
ily near Osaka. By the age of twenty Bashó's travels. In this two-scroll set, abstract stylization.
he was drawn to Edo, perhaps to dated 1778 when the artist was sixty-
become an actor. He took up Confu- two, he illustrates Bashó's text with The design of the Great Waue rehearses
cian studies and Chinese painting, a mere thirteen deftly sketched many of Hokusai's favorite composi-
and began to publish haikai, a seven- scenes. Scroll one includes Departure, tional methods: to the lowered
teen-syllable verse form. Buson was Nasuno, Sukagawa, lizuka Village, the western-style horizon he has added
initially attracted to realistic painting Jar-Shaped Stone Memorial, Suema- another feature from western art, the
styles: he studied the descriptive tsuyama, Shiogama, and the Barrier large object in the foreground that
flower-and-bird images associated Gate at Shitomae. Scroll two pictures serves as an element of repoussoir (see
with émigré Chinese artists like Shen Natagiri Pass, Sakata, Ichifuri, Betsuri, cat. i88).The great swell in the fore-
Nan'pin and the academic approach and Fukui. MT ground echoes Fuji's triangular shape
of the Ming-dynasty Zhe school, in on the horizon, while the menacing,
addition to Kano- and Rinpa-school clawlike spume of the great wave,
painting. From this unlikely combina- 169 about to engulf the three hapless
tion of sources, Buson in his later Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) fishing boats, forms yet a third, more
years distilled the nimble, witty man- Great Waue, from Thirty-six Views abstract triangle. Hokusai reminds
ner known today as haiga (haiku of Mount Fuji us here that nature is an active force,
painting). Buson himself called these c. 1830-1832 and not always benevolent to the
paintings haikai mono (haiku things). world of human beings. MT
An inveterate wanderer all his life, Color woodblock print
15 Vs)
26 x 38.4 (lo'Ax
Buson traveled to the "Deep North" Los Angeles County Museum of Art,
(Dewa and Mutsu provinces) from
Gift of the Frederick Weisman
1745 to 1747 in order to understand Company
firsthand the epic literary journey of
the great poet Matsuo Bashó. In 1751
• This famous image exemplifies
he settled part-time in Kyoto and the fate of the art object in the age
began to paint seriously for a living. of mechanical reproduction: it has
Buson reached artistic maturity in his become so familiar through appear-
fifties. During the last decade of his
ances on tee shirts, handbags, book-
marks, coffee mugs, and stamps
that it is nearly impossible to view
with fresh eyes. The dilemma is
compounded by the multiple wood-
block editions of the print issued
during and after Hokusai's time.
The image is a victim of its own
popularity.