A Closer Look: Episode 31 - Katsushika Ōi
Hokusai is one of Japan’s best known artists, designing many of the most striking prints in the country’s woodblock tradition. His daughter, Katsushika Ōi, assisted him in the family business, as nineteenth-century women in Japan often did.
Unlike many women of her generation, however, Ōi became a highly skilled and sought-after painter in her own right. In this episode, Dr Kathleen Olive discusses one of Ōi’s most accomplished surviving works, which reveals the social and artistic changes sweeping Japan in the period of the Meiji Restoration.
The artwork is today preserved in the collection of the Ōta Memorial Museum of Art in Tokyo. A high resolution image is available here.
Dr Kathleen Olive
Kathleen is a specialist in Italian language and literature and has led tours to Italy, France, Spain, the USA, Japan and Australasia for more than fifteen years. Kathleen is a director of Limelight Arts Travel.
Dr Nick Gordon
Nick is a historian of Italy and of Western Europe in the Middle Ages and Early Modern period. He has led tours to Italy, France, Germany, Scandinavia, East Asia and Australasia for more than fifteen years. Nick is a director of Limelight Arts Travel.