Hokusai: Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji from the Iuchi Collection.

The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo｜March 28 – June 14, 2026

Katsushika Hokusai, Under the Wave off Kanagawa (‘The Great Wave’), from the series “Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji,” c. 1830-33, colour woodblock,  The National Museum of Western Art, deposited by Iuchi Collection

When an image becomes myth, how do we begin to see it anew?

In spring 2026, the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo will present Hokusai: Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji from the Iuchi Collection, the first full public exhibition of 46 original prints from Katsushika Hokusai’s iconic landscape series, along with two rare variant impressions: the elusive indigo-toned “Blue Fuji” and an exceptionally well-preserved version of Under the Wave off Kanagawa.

More than a historical retrospective, this exhibition explores the visual volatility of repetition. It is not just the subject—Mount Fuji—but the differences between impressions that matter: color, paper, pressure, age. In doing so, the show raises critical questions about perception, reproduction, and the cultural migration of images across centuries and continents.

Hokusai’s legacy in the West is well-known. His compositions famously influenced Monet, Degas, and Van Gogh. But here, within the walls of Japan’s foremost Western art museum, we are asked to reconsider Hokusai not as a peripheral inspiration but as a central figure in global visual consciousness.

Exhibited concurrently with M.K. Čiurlionis: The Inner Constellation—featuring the Lithuanian symbolist’s metaphysical visions—this exhibition creates a resonant dialogue between two artists who used landscape not as background, but as metaphor for the inner world.

Up Left: Katsushika Hokusai,  Sudden Rain Beneath the Summit

Up Right: Katsushika Hokusai,  Sazai Hall, Five Hundred Arhat Temple

Down Left: Katsushika Hokusai, Hodogaya on the Tokaido Highway

Down Right: Katsushika Hokusai, Clear Day with a Southern Breeze ('Red Fuji')

※All works are from the series “Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji,” c. 1830-33, colour woodblock,  The National Museum of Western Art, deposited by Iuchi Collection

Exhibition Information

Title: Hokusai: Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji from the Iuchi Collection

Venue: The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo (Special Exhibition Wing B3F)

Dates: March 28 (Sat) – June 14 (Sun), 2026

Organizers: The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo; The Yomiuri Shimbun

Cooperation: The Western Art Foundation

Curator: Katsushika Hokusai (Jumonji University / NMWA Guest Researcher)

Website: https://www.nmwa.go.jp/en/exhibitions/2026hokusai.html

Concurrent Exhibition: M.K. Čiurlionis: The Inner Constellation