10 Most Famous Japanese Painting Masterpieces

One of the most recognizable Japanese paintings is The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife. It was executed in 1814 by famous artist Hokusai. If we follow strict definitions, this amazing Hokusai’s piece could not be considered as a painting, since it’s a woodcut design of the ukiyo-e genre from the book Kinoe no Komatsu, which is a three-volume book of shunga erotica. The composition depicts a young ama diver entwined sexually with a pair of octopuses. This Japanese painting was quite influential in the 19th and 20th Century. The work has influenced later artists such as Félicien Rops, Auguste Rodin, Louis Aucoc, Fernand Khnopff, and Pablo Picasso.

Featured image: Katsushika Hokusai - The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife. Captions, via Creative Commons

Tomioka Tessai is a pseudonym for a famous Japanese artist and calligrapher. He is regarded as the last major artist in the Bunjinga tradition and one of the first major artists of the japanese art style called Nihonga. Bunjinga tradition was a school of Japanese painting which flourished in the late Edo period among artists who considered themselves literati, or intellectuals. Each of these Japanese artists, including Tessai developed their own style and technique, but all of them were great admirers of Chinese art and culture.

Featured image: Tomioka Tessai - Abe-no-Nakamaro Writing A Nostalgic Poem While Viewing The Moon. Captions, via Creative Commons 

Fujishima Takeji was a Japanese painter, noted for his work in developing Romanticism and Impressionist art within the yōga (Western-style) art movement in late 19th- and early 20th-century Japanese painting. In 1905, he traveled to France, where he was influenced by French movements of that time, particularly by Impressionism, which can be seen in his painting Sunrise over the Eastern Sea that was executed in 1932.

Featured image: Fujishima Takeji - Sunrise over the Eastern Sea. Captions, via Creative Commons 

Kitagawa Utamaro was a prominent Japanese artist and painter who was born in 1753 and died in 1806. He is certainly best-known for his series entitled Ten Studies in Female Physiognomy, A Collection of Reigning Beauties, Great Love Themes of Classical Poetry (sometimes called Women in Love containing individual prints such as Revealed Love and Pensive Love). He is one of the most important Japanese artists who belong to the ukiyo-e genre of woodblock prints.

Featured image: Kitagawa Utamaro - Woman Wiping Sweat from her Brow, 1798 (Ten Studies in Female Physiognomy, A Collection of Reigning Beauties). Captions, via Creative Commons

Kawanabe Kyosai was one of the most prominent Japanese artists of the Edo period. His art was influenced by the work of Tohaku, a Kano artist of the sixteenth century who was the only artist of his period to paint screens entirely in ink on a delicate background of powdered gold. Although Kyosai is best-known as caricaturist, he created some of the most notable paintings in the Japanese history of art of the 19th Century. Tiger is one of these paintings where Kyosai used watercolor and ink to create this picture.

Featured image: Kawanabe Kyosai - Tiger

Hiroshi Yoshida is known as one of the most important figures of the shin-hanga style (shin-hanga was an art movement in early 20th-century Japan, during the Taishō and Shōwa periods, that revitalized traditional ukiyo-e art rooted in the Edo and Meiji periods (17th–19th century). He was trained in the Western oil painting tradition, which was adopted into Japanese art styles during the Meiji period.

Featured image: Hiroshi Yoshida - Fuji from Kawaguchi Lake

Takashi Murakami is probably the most popular Japanese artists today. His works are being sold for astronomical prices at big auctions, while his art has been already inspiring the whole new generations of artists, not only in Japan, but internationally. Murakami’s art encompasses a wide range of mediums and is generally described as superflat. His work has been noted for its use of color, incorporation of motifs from Japanese traditional and popular culture. The content of his paintings is often described as “cute,” “psychedelic,” or “satirical”.

Featured image: Takashi Murakami - 727

Yayoi Kusama is also one of the most renowned contemporary Japanese artists. She creates in a variety of different media, including painting, collage, scat sculpture, performance, environmental and installation art, most of which exhibit her thematic interest in psychedelic colors, repetition and pattern. One of the most renowned series by this great artist is Pumpkin series. Covered in polka dots in a rich yellow color, the iconic pumpkin is presented against a background of nets. When coupled, all such elements form a visual language that is unmistakable to the artist’s style, and has been evolved and perfected through decades of painstaking production and reproduction.

Find more interesting artworks by Yayoi Kusama!

Featured image: Yayoi Kusama - Pumpkin

Tenmyouya Hisashi is contemporary Japanese artist, who is best-known for his "Neo-Nihonga" paintings. He participated in the revival of the old Japanese painting tradition, and it represents an antithesis to a modern Japanese-style painting. In 2000, he also created his new style "Butouha" which shows the resistant attitude for authoritative art system through his paintings. Japanese Spirit No. 14 was created as part of the "BASARA" art scheme, interpreted in Japanese culture as a rebellious behavior of lower-class aristocracy during the Warring States Period to deny authority in pursuit of an ideal lifestyle by dressing in magnificent and luxurious costumes and acting in free will, did not match their social class identities.

Featured image: Tenmyouya Hisashi - Japanese Spirit No. 14

Finally, The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai is probably the most recognizable Japanese painting ever made. It’s actually the most prominent piece of art “made in Japan”. It depicts an enormous wave threatening boats off the coast of the prefecture of Kanagawa. While sometimes assumed to be a tsunami, the wave is, as the picture’s title suggests, more likely to be a large rogue wave. The painting is executed in the tradition of ukiyo-e.

Featured image: Katsushika Hokusai - The Great Wave off Kanagawa. All Images used for illustrative purposes only.