Fishing Boats at Choshi in Shimosa (Soshu Choshi) from the series "One Thousand Pictures of the Ocean (Chie no umi)"

Fishing Boats at Choshi in Shimosa (Soshu Choshi) is an ukiyo-e print by Katsushika Hokusai from the series One Thousand Pictures of the Ocean (Chie no umi), dated about 1828 and held in the Art Institute of Chicago. Choshi, a coastal town at the mouth of the Tone River in Shimosa Province, was famous for its dramatic cliffs, deep-sea fisheries, and rough Pacific waters. Hokusai depicts a fleet of fishing boats riding heavy swells off the coast, their crews crouched at oars and nets while breakers crest into white foam around them. The composition concentrates on the muscular geometry of waves, with curling crests echoing the smaller, more famous Great Wave from the Thirty-six Views series. The Chie no umi project examines the ocean as a site of labor and danger, presenting the lives of fishermen and coastal communities across various provinces. As an Edo ukiyo-e print, the design exploits Prussian blue pigment for the deep tones of the sea, careful tonal printing for cloud and spray, and the rhythmic patterning of wave crests that became one of Katsushika Hokusai's signature graphic forms. The Art Institute of Chicago preserves this ukiyo-e print as part of its broad Hokusai holdings, documenting how the artist extended his oceanic vocabulary beyond Fuji into the working coasts of nineteenth-century Japan.