Fleeting Pleasures: Japanese Woodblock Prints from the Georgia Museum of Art

The exhibition consisted of 27 prints from the museum’s permanent collection, including the 19th-century iconic image “The Great Wave off Kanagawa.” That print is part of Hokusai’s well-known Thirty-Six Views of Mt. Fuji series. Other prints from the series were also on display along with four prints from artist Hiroshige’s series of the same name. Besides Hokusai and Hiroshige, the exhibition included works from other prominent ukiyo-e artists. Ukiyo-e, which means pictures of the floating world, was inspired by the fleeting beauty of the Japanese city Edo and its culture. The artists drew their subject matter from the city, which became Tokyo, with many images featuring scenes from Kabuki dramas and, later, images of the natural world and famous sights across Japan.