Under the Wave off Kanagawa (The Great Wave)

Katsushika Hokusai

Polychrome woodblock print; ink and color on paper

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Under the Wave off Kanagawa, commonly known as The Great Wave, is a polychrome woodblock print depicting three oshiokuri-bune — fast fishing barges — imperiled beneath a towering, claw-like wave, with the sacred Mount Fuji rendered small and serene in the distant background. Created circa 1830–32 during Japan's Edo period, it is the first and most celebrated print in Hokusai's landmark series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, distinguished by its bold use of the then newly available Prussian blue pigment. Hokusai, born in Edo (present-day Tokyo) in 1760, synthesized traditional Japanese ukiyo-e printmaking conventions with European linear perspective, producing a composition of extraordinary dynamism and visual sophistication. The print has been described as possibly the most reproduced image in the history of art and stands as the defining icon of Japanese visual culture worldwide.