About the Artwork
Surface of Lake Misaka is a Japanese ukiyo-e print by Katsushika Hokusai, created in the early nineteenth century as part of his landmark series Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji (c. 1830–1833). Set near the mountainous lakes west of Edo, the work presents Mount Fuji reflected across the still waters of Lake Misaka, its form fragmented and softened by the lake’s surface.
The composition is defined by restraint. A broad expanse of water occupies the foreground, its subtle ripples catching light and dissolving Fuji’s reflection into shifting planes of colour. Hokusai uses a limited palette - cool blues, pale greys, and gentle earth tones - to evoke a quiet, suspended atmosphere. Human presence, if at all implied, is peripheral; the scene belongs to the lake, the mountain, and the delicate movement between them.
Rather than dramatizing Fuji as a monumental force, Hokusai renders it as something transient and perceptual - seen indirectly, altered by water and light. The mountain appears not as a fixed symbol but as an image in flux, dependent on viewpoint and conditions. This subtle play between permanence and instability reflects a core concern of the series: how an eternal form is continually re-experienced through time, weather, and place.
Today, Surface of Lake Misaka resonates as a meditation on reflection and stillness. In a visual culture saturated with immediacy and spectacle, the print invites slower looking. Its power lies in what it withholds - encouraging contemplation of how meaning often emerges not from clarity, but from quiet distortion and pause.
About the Artist
