Daisen Hoki in the distance
by Oda Kazuma
- Medium:
- Woodblock print
- Source:
- Japanese Art Open Database
- Image courtesy of
- Japanese Art Open Database
Description
Mount Daisen—the volcanic peak in present-day Tottori Prefecture that formed the heart of the historical Hoki Province—rises to 1,729 meters and has been a subject of reverent landscape depiction since the Edo period. Oda's print renders the mountain from a distance, likely across flat coastal or agricultural land characteristic of the Tottori plain, with the peak appearing above a middle ground of fields, villages, or coastal features. The composition follows a classical [meisho-e](/glossary/meisho-e) structure: foreground locating detail, receding middle ground, and the mountain as organizing horizon element. Daisen's asymmetrical profile differs visually from Fuji, and Oda's documentary instinct likely preserves that specificity rather than imposing a generic mountain formula.
