Koichi Okada (1907-?) – Mount Fuji and Lake Kawaguchi (Koichi Okada – Kawaguchi-ko no Fuji)

Original woodblock print. The first edition of this design was published in 1954. The current print was printed in the Reiwa period (2019 – present).

Mount Fuji and Lake Kawaguchi is part of a series of prints of the Mount Fuji made by Okada Koichi in the 1950s for woodblock print publisher Unsodo. Like the other prints in the series, it depicts Mount Fuji, along with a water body. In some cases that is the sea (as with Okada Koichi – Mount Fuji from the coast of Hagoromo), but here it is one of the five lakes around Mount Fuji, namely Lake Kawaguchi.

The design makes it seem as if one is looking past the branches of a Cherry tree, an often used technique by woodblock artists to enhance the experience of depth. Far away is the Mount Fuji, up in the sky, and reflected in the calm Lake. Judging by the blossoming Cherry tree, it must be the very end of winter, or, more likely, early spring. The colors of the Cherry blossoms resonate with the colors of the Mount Fuji and its reflection, all together making this perhaps the calmest and most serene composition in the series.

The colors of the Cherry blossoms, and in line with that those of the Mount Fuji and its reflection, can vary quite a lot between editions. They range from quite strong, to very light, almost white. This is why we have listed this design multiple times. The current print is a quite light version, close in color to the first editions from the 1950s.

Publisher: Unsodo

Image size (excluding margins): 36.5 * 24.0 cm (14.4 * 9.4 in).

The print is in excellent condition.

The pictures shown here are from the print itself.

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Okada Koichi is known for his series of woodblock prints “Twelve views of Japan”, created around the year 1950. The series might have been intended to consist of twelve different prints, but only six are known. They depict the mount Fuji seen from Hakone, Lake Kawaguchi, Lake Ashinoko, Hagoromo and overlooking Nihondaira. All these have been printed using the original woodblocks by Unsodo, the same publisher that published the first editions.

See an overview of Koichi Okada's woodblock prints