# Flying Cuckoo

**Katsushika Hokusai** (Japanese, 1760–1849)  
ca. 1809  
Ink and color on paper  
H x W (overall): 62.5 x 120.6 cm (24 5/8 x 47 1/2 in)

Courtesy of the National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution, F1904.187. [The museum's record](https://asia.si.edu/object/F1904.187/).

## About this work

Katsushika Hokusai painted this in about 1809, aged 49. It is now at the National Museum of Asian Art in Washington, DC.

### What you’re looking at

Fan (mounted as a hanging scroll)

_Description from the National Museum of Asian Art._

### How it was made

- **Ink on paper.** Ink made from soot and animal glue, ground with water on an inkstone. A single brush can give a hair-fine line or a broad wash, and nothing can be corrected.

### [Katsushika Hokusai](https://www.ochreeditions.com/artists/katsushika-hokusai)

Japanese, 1760–1849

Hokusai trained in the studio of the actor-portraitist Katsukawa Shunshō and went on to work under more than thirty names across a career of some seventy years. Alongside book illustration, paintings and the sketch volumes known as Hokusai Manga, he made landscape a leading subject of ukiyo-e with Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, issued around 1830–33, in which the mountain appears from city, coast and countryside, often in the newly imported Prussian blue.

_Written by Ochre Editions._

## Facts

- Type: Painting
- Culture: Japanese
- The artist was 49
- Real size: about 25 × 47 in (63 × 121 cm). The original is larger than our largest print, 30 × 40 in, so every print is a reduction.
- Century: 19th century
- Subjects: Animals, Edo period, Japan, (1600 - 1868), Birds, Ukiyo-e, Poetry
- Colour: brown
- Rights: public domain (CC0 1.0); free to use for any purpose.

## Get it

- Free download, full resolution: https://img.ochreeditions.com/m/1776.jpg?dl=1
- Image: https://img.ochreeditions.com/a/1776/1920.jpg
- Giclée reproduction on Hahnemühle Photo Rag: 8 × 10 in $28; 11 × 14 in $38; 12 × 16 in $42; 16 × 20 in $56; 18 × 24 in $68; 20 × 30 in $86; 24 × 36 in $108; 30 × 40 in $148
- Framed reproduction: 8 × 10 in $78; 11 × 14 in $98; 12 × 16 in $108; 16 × 20 in $138; 18 × 24 in $164; 20 × 30 in $208; 24 × 36 in $258; 30 × 40 in $338
- Canvas reproduction: 8 × 10 in $58; 11 × 14 in $72; 12 × 16 in $79; 16 × 20 in $98; 18 × 24 in $118; 20 × 30 in $148; 24 × 36 in $178; 30 × 40 in $228
- Print-ready file: 8 × 10 in $2; 11 × 14 in $2; 12 × 16 in $3; 16 × 20 in $3; 18 × 24 in $3; 20 × 30 in $5; 24 × 36 in $5; 30 × 40 in $5

Sizes stop where the museum's file would print below 150 pixels per inch. Everything sold is a reproduction, made to order. [Order a print](https://www.ochreeditions.com/art/flying-cuckoo-si-fsg-f1904-187).