A demonstration record, compiled from public archives. Katsushika Hokusai did not write it; the institutions cited here did. Sources and clearance →
Exhibition
c. 1760 to 1849
The record holds the working life of an Edo-period printmaker whom museum catalogs enter under a single name, though the institution most fully documenting his career records at least seven names across roughly seven decades of practice.
Museum catalogs enter him uniformly as Katsushika Hokusai, Japanese, 1760 to 1849. The Sumida Hokusai Museum's own account of his working life records at least seven names across that life: Shunro after he entered the Katsukawa school, then Sori, then Hokusai Tatsumasa, then Katsushika Hokusai and Taito together in the 1804 to 1811 period, then Iitsu, then Manji from 1834 onward. The Art Institute of Chicago dates the design of Under the Wave off Kanagawa, from the series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, to 1830 to 1833, and states in its own catalog description that the series began when he was seventy. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which holds a separate impression of the same print at accession JP1847, states in its own published essay that Hokusai was only one of the artists involved in making it, and that he is the only one of them whose name is now known. The Metropolitan Museum's essay on the woodblock process states that a print of this kind required the collaboration of four experts: the designer, the engraver, the printer, and the publisher. One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji, a three-volume woodblock-printed book the Art Institute of Chicago catalogs as a complete set in its own collection, carries a first two volumes dated 1834 to 1835 and a third volume the museum dates to about 1849, the year of his death. The Hokusai Manga, a set of sketchbooks, was published in volumes from 1812 into 1878, per the Art Institute of Chicago's own cataloging of its incomplete run of a fifteen-volume set, which continued for decades after his death.
Color woodblock print, oban. The Art Institute of Chicago holds this impression and catalogs the object under the CC0 Public Domain Designation. It is the same mountain as the first entry and the opposite weather: the summit in clear air above a storm, with the lightning printed in the dark skirt of the hill.
The Art Institute of Chicago. CC0 Public Domain Designation
Woodblock print. The Metropolitan Museum of Art (JP1847) and the Art Institute of Chicago (1925.3245) each hold a separate impression, and both catalog the object public domain.
Woodblock-printed book in three volumes. The Art Institute of Chicago catalogs its set complete and public domain.
A set of woodblock-printed sketchbooks issued in volumes, several after his death. The Art Institute of Chicago's holding runs volumes 1 through 3, 5 through 11, and 14 of a fifteen-volume set.
1760
Institutional catalogs consulted here (the Art Institute of Chicago, the Sumida Hokusai Museum) give 1760 as his birth year. None states an exact day.
1778 to 1798
Per the Sumida Hokusai Museum's account of his working life.
1804 to 1811
Per the same museum account. The name that became the catalog standard first appears in this window.
1812 to 1878
The Art Institute of Chicago's own holding runs volumes 1 through 3, 5 through 11, and 14 of a fifteen-volume set, published across this span.
1821 to 1823
Per the Sumida Hokusai Museum's account.
c. 1830 to 1833
The Art Institute of Chicago dates the design to this span and states the series began at about seventy.
1834 to c. 1849
The Art Institute of Chicago catalogs the set as complete: volumes one and two dated 1834 to 1835, volume three dated about 1849.
1849
The Sumida Hokusai Museum's account places his death in the spring of 1849, after illness, describing what it calls a ninety-year life by the traditional Japanese count.
7 names
Recorded art names, per the Sumida Hokusai Museum's own account of his working life: Shunro, Sori, Hokusai Tatsumasa, Katsushika Hokusai, Taito, Iitsu, and Manji.
~70
Age at Under the Wave off Kanagawa, stated directly in the Art Institute of Chicago's own catalog description of the series.
15 volumes
Hokusai Manga, total, per the Art Institute of Chicago's own cataloging of its incomplete holding (volumes 1 through 3, 5 through 11, and 14 of 15).
3 volumes
One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji, cataloged complete in the Art Institute of Chicago's own collection.
89 years
Recorded lifespan by Western count, 1760 to 1849. The Sumida Hokusai Museum's own account describes a ninety-year life by the traditional Japanese count.
Not by birth, and not his only one. The Sumida Hokusai Museum's account of his working life records at least seven names across his career, from Shunro in his youth to Manji late in life. Katsushika Hokusai is the one that became the catalog standard.
No. The Metropolitan Museum's own account of the woodblock process states a print of this kind required four experts: the designer, the engraver who carves the blocks, the printer, and the publisher. The part of the record that is his is the design.
About seventy. The Art Institute of Chicago's catalog description states the series began at that age, against a print the museum dates to 1830 to 1833 and a recorded birth year of 1760.
No. It is a woodblock print, meaning impressions were pulled from the same carved blocks rather than painted once. The Metropolitan Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago each hold a separate impression, cataloged separately.
The record he left continued past that date in print. The Art Institute of Chicago catalogs the Hokusai Manga as published in volumes from 1812 into 1878, decades after his death.