#29 Under the Wave off Kanagawa — Coaster

It is not a tsunami. It is an *okinami*, a steep offshore wave, and the boats beneath it are fast cargo skiffs running fresh fish to the Edo markets — the crews are crouched low and holding on, which is what you do, not drowning. The small pale triangle in the trough is Mount Fuji, and the print belongs to a series of thirty-six views of the mountain. Hokusai was past seventy when he cut it, and still signing himself the old man mad about painting. Art Institute of Chicago.