The Great Wave

 

The Great Wave off Kanagawa

“I did not know that one could be so terrifying with blue and green…these waves are claws, the boat is caught in it, you can feel it.”

Vincent van Gogh, letter to his brother Theo,  9/8/1888.

Hokusai’s The Great Wave off Kanagawa, created in the early 1830s, is one of the most famous images in the history of art. Though often referred to as a painting, it is actually a woodblock print—part of Hokusai’s series entitled Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji. This is a picture of a towering wave about to engulf three fishing boats.  A tranquil Mount Fuji is seen in the background. This image is so popular that it turns up in any number of places, including the tote bag shown here.

Of course, the wave dominates the scene with great, talon-like crests that tower over the boats.  It is not only terrifying and beautiful; it is totally indifferent to humankind. The boats, dwarfed and tossed by the sea, give us a sense of human fragility.  Meanwhile, Mount Fuji, Japan’s sacred mountain, sits calmly in the distance, showing a stark contrast to the chaos in the foreground. This comparison between the transient and the eternal seems to be part of the print’s message.

There may be a number of pictures that we might like to walk into and be a part of—but this is definitely not one of them. Although The Great Wave is one of my all-time favorites, it is frankly terrifying.  Here we have a difficult life journey in paint: small, frightened people facing a towering natural menace.  You can almost feel the whip of the spray on your face, the smell of the salt in the air, and a sense of the shuddering of fragile, wooden timbers, as the little boat is battered around in the sea. And up ahead is that great monster wall of a wave, waiting in all its menacing glory.

The artist, Hokusai created this print in his seventies, from an actual place, Sagami Bay in the Kanagawa Prefecture.  Although he was struck by lightning at aged 50, Hokusai survived to the ripe old age of 88.  Apparently, Hokusai went by more than 30 names throughout his career including Shunro, Sori, Kako, Taito, Gakyojin, Iitsu, and Manji. Towards the end of his life, he went by the name of Gakyojin, ‘He once said, “I used to call myself Hokusai, but today I sign myself ‘The Old Man Mad about Drawing’ ”.

They say that he once remarked that he only began to understand the truth of nature in his later years. The Great Wave reflects this deep insight—not just into the physical world, but into its emotional and spiritual echoes. The fishermen in the boats might not be merely subjects; they could be metaphors for human resilience. Their struggle against the wave shows us the broader human condition: our efforts to navigate life’s unpredictable currents and the challenges we face from the forces that confront us.

Today, the image is reproduced on everything from posters to coffee mugs, yet it is still powerful.  Ultimately, The Great Wave off Kanagawa is more than the picture of a natural event—it seems to be a comment on existence. It invites us to consider the forces that shape our lives, the vulnerability of human existence, and the over-whelming presence of nature. Through its layered symbolism, Hokusai’s print seems to encourage us to face our biggest fears in order to live life to the fullest, even if it means swimming with the fishes.