Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858) | The complete set of Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (Fuji sanjurokkei) | Edo period, 19th century

Along with One Hundred Famous Views of Edo, the Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji was Hiroshige's last major landscape series in the vertical oban format. All prints are dated to the fourth month of 1858, five months before Hiroshige's death. The contents table was produced in 1859, most likely for the bound album edition. The series invites direct comparison with Katsushika Hokusai (1760–1849), whose series of the same name, produced some three decades earlier, contains some of the most iconic designs in the history of Japanese art (see Lots 188-199).

Several compositions pay homage to Hokusai's designs. The Sea off Satta in Suruga recalls Under the Wave off Kanagawa, also known as The Great Wave. Tempestuous waters thrash in the lower right, while plovers (chidori) in flight appear as if dissolving into the spray, creating an elegant visual confusion (mitate) also seen in his Awa Province: Naruto Whirlpools (see Lot 223). In Koganei in Musashi, Mount Fuji is glimpsed through the hollow of a cherry tree trunk — a framing device reminiscent of Hokusai's Fuji View Plain in Owari Province, in which the mountain is encircled by an enormous wooden barrel (see Lot 197).

It is perhaps telling that Hiroshige did not design any large Mount Fuji series until after Hokusai's death in 1849, apart from a few fan prints on the subject in the early 1840s.