# Hokusai artist context and auction value notes

Canonical page: https://appraisily.com/artist/hokusai/
Profile generated: 2026-08-24T08:49:54.999Z
Quality: medium confidence, adequate sources

## Artist identity

- Nationality: Japanese
- Movements: Ukiyo-e, Japonisme influence in late-19th-century Europe
- Common media: Woodblock prints, Painting, Drawing

## Portrait

![Hokusai](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1c/Hokusai_as_an_old_man.jpg/1280px-Hokusai_as_an_old_man.jpg)
missing name · CC0
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hokusai_as_an_old_man.jpg

## About Hokusai

Hokusai, also known as Katsushika Hokusai, was a Japanese painter, printmaker, and draftsman who lived from 1760 to 1849. Active during the Edo period, he is closely associated with ukiyo-e and is especially important to the history of Japanese landscape imagery. His practice encompassed woodblock prints, paintings, and drawings, with subjects ranging from landscapes and Mount Fuji to plants and animals. Collectors most readily recognize his Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, the series that includes The Great Wave off Kanagawa, as well as the wide-ranging drawings associated with Hokusai Manga. Hokusai broadened the subject matter commonly linked with ukiyo-e, and his images later became influential within the European interest in Japanese art known as Japonisme. His long working life and numerous recorded names mean that objects connected with him can appear under several cataloguing forms, including Hokusai, Katsushika Hokusai, and Hokusai Tokitarō.

## Common works and media

Collectors commonly encounter Hokusai through ukiyo-e woodblock prints, particularly landscapes connected with Mount Fuji. Paintings and drawings also form part of his documented practice, while Hokusai Manga represents another widely recognized body of graphic work. Subjects recorded in the collected sources include landscapes, plants, animals, and views of Mount Fuji. Because familiar compositions may exist in materially different forms or impressions, the medium, series attribution, and precise object characteristics should be established before selecting auction comparables.

## Market and appraisal context

Hokusai appears in auction and appraisal contexts through woodblock prints, paintings, and drawings. Assessment begins by identifying the work type, subject, and any relationship to a documented series such as Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji. Relevant public auction records can then provide comparable context, but a famous image or series title does not by itself establish authorship, date, edition, impression quality, or value. Hokusai's many recorded names also make careful identity matching important. A responsible appraisal should examine the individual object and compare it with closely related lots, while considering evidence not supplied in this source pack, including condition, provenance, edition details, and printing characteristics. The available evidence supports contextual comparison, not a price forecast.

## Appraisily data basis

Appraisily artist pages combine public artist-identity research with auction records, auction-house context, sale dates, realized prices, and comparable lots when those records are available. Each object still requires individual examination.

## Sources

- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5586
- IdRef: https://www.idref.fr/03416958X
- VIAF: https://viaf.org/viaf/69033717/
- Getty Vocabulary Program: https://vocab.getty.edu/page/ulan/500060426
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hokusai
- Wikipedia: https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katsushika_Hokusai
- Appraisily: https://appraisily.com/artist/hokusai/