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From: RS
Category: Books
Date: 07 September 2004
This is a great book, I have been lying in bed every night, sleepily flicking through the plates, or dipping into an essay, and usually conking out fast, my brain dazzled by the richness of Hokusai's talent.
Hokusai from his sex pictures, to his super-alive animals, and his landscapes with their zinging colours challenges ideas separating decorative and imaginative art. Hokusai (1760-1849) lived as long and nearly parallel to Goya (1746-1828), yet his work, perhaps by virtue of being less exposed as part of our serious Western Culture and re-entering again in Manga etc, does not look old, it has none of the rotting stench of out-of-date painting: dark glazes and scratchy canvas.
Hokusai seems free to use perspective or not, fantasy or observation, combine any genre, and throw in a bit of three colour separation here or there. There is an airy disregard for convention, which plays out of course within an artform that is of course highly formal.
Anyway, think about Hokusai. Other facts: as a performance he made a 350 square metre painting in a day. Every time he changed style he changed name, giving the old name to his pupils.
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