Katsushika-Hokusai "birds and sunset" Canvas Tote

Your friends will never confuse their old tote bags with yours, a piece of artwork that will delight someone for years.

This canvas tote bag with “birds and sunset” by Katsushika-Hokusai will grace any shopping trip or picnic. This fine, serene artwork is a vintage Japanese woodblock print from his 1814 “Album of Sketches”. Noted for his skill and use of color, Hokusai heavily influenced the Impressionists. Impressionists were the Bohemians of the time, breaking conventional rules to create new ones. His “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” certainly did that.

Did you know he was apprenticed at 14, and later expelled from that school? The embarrassment from his teacher spurred him on to develop his own style. He also changed his name a lot. Late in life he called himself Gakyo rojin manji,' The Old Man Mad About Art.' We owe the term ‘Manga’ to him – he made funny drawings of his students. Sadly, much of his over 30,000 works were destroyed in a fire. His daughter also later became an artist in her own right.

Although he didn’t live to be 110 years old, this is when he thought he would produce his best work. He followed the Nichiren school of Buddhism, which believed that Mount Fuji was associated with eternal life, the secret being placed somewhere on it’s peak. That could be why his masterpiece is considered to be Thirsty-Six Views of Mount Fuji. Which actually is 46 prints. Kind of like The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy having five volumes.

These tote bags are with 100% cotton sheeting. Add their reinforced handle stitching to the mix, and you got a reliable bag rich in both practicality and durability.
.: Lightweight and compact
.: Handle Length: 21.5" (54.61cm)