British Museum acquires 103 Hokusai drawings from a book never published

103 drawings by Katsushika Hokusai become part of the British Museum’s collections. These were made in black and white in 1829 to illustrate a literary work that was later never published, entitled The Great Illustrated Book of Everything.

For more than seventy years the drawings by the celebrated Japanese artist were “lost”: they were last exhibited in 1948 at an auction and only in 2019 did they reappear in Paris. They depict animals, flowers, religious and historical scenes, mythological and literary figures; a wide variety of themes and many subjects that Hokusai had never depicted before, particularly fascinating scenes about the origins of humans in ancient China.

According to the British Museum, which holds one of the most significant collections of the Japanese painter outside his native country, these drawings are highly relevant because they belong to a less than fertile period of Hokusai’s artistic activity.

Tim Clark, curator of Japanese collections at the British Museum, confirmed that “these works constitute an important rediscovery that greatly expands our knowledge of the artist’s activities in a crucial period of his life and work. All 103 sketches show the imagination, inventiveness and drawing skill typical of his later works.”

The drawings can be seen on the British Museum website and will be the subject of a future exhibition.

Pictured is one of the 103 Hokusai drawings acquired by the British Museum.

British Museum acquires 103 Hokusai drawings from a book never published

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