One-Hundred Views of Fuji (Fugaku hyakkei)

One-Hundred Views of Fuji (Fugaku hyakkei) is the title of Katsushika Hokusai's three-volume illustrated book, an Edo [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) landmark held in the Art Institute of Chicago and recorded here under a 1829 date. Where the Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji had set the mountain as a constant background to color landscape prints, Fugaku hyakkei pushes that idea further by gathering nearly a hundred separate compositions, all in monochrome or near-monochrome printing, all united by the figure of Mount Fuji somewhere in the design. Some pages place Fuji squarely at the center; others bury it in the corner behind a working figure or glimpse it through architecture. The book is also where Hokusai wrote the famous postscript reflecting on his own development, declaring that everything he had drawn before the age of seventy was unworthy of consideration. As an Edo ukiyo-e project, Fugaku hyakkei is one of the most influential illustrated books in the entire tradition, widely reprinted and widely studied. For collectors and students of Hokusai, copies of the book are essential reference material alongside his color prints. The Art Institute of Chicago holds the work within its Japanese illustrated book collection, where it sits at the heart of any account of the artist's mature work.