Over a century and a half after his death, Katsushika Hokusai is still one of Japan's most popular and influential artists. This handy volume presents the wide range of Hokusai's aristic production in terms of one of his most remarkable characteristics : his intellectual ingenuity. It attempts to show how he combined figures and landscape, represented three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional surface, and used the techniques of illusionism or adjusted reality for greater visual or emotional effect.

"Katsushika Hokusai remains one of Japan's most popular and influential artists. This handy volume presents the wide range of Hokusai's artistic production in terms of one of his most remarkable characteristics: his intellectual ingenuity. It explores the question of how the self-styled "Man Mad about Drawing" approached his subjects--how he depicted human bodies in motion, combined figures and landscapes, represented three-dimensional objects on two-dimensional surfaces and when he used the techniques of illusionism or adjusted reality for greater visual or emotional effect. Including some 50 stunning and unusual paintings, prints and drawings from the peerless Hokusai collection at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, this book is a treasure trove that introduces readers to a witty, wide-ranging and inimitably ingenious Hokusai."--from MFA Boston exhibition website.