Cushion Pine at Aoyama

The cushion pine at Aoyama was the most known trees at the precinct of Ryuganji which was 5.6 meters wide. Some other smaller pine trees were also planted in around so that to surround it. A famous artist called Katsushika Hokusai depicted the Mt Fuji as a triangle and the hill of pine trees as a semi-circle.

Pine trees have outspreading branches that make it appear as a gigantic green cushion. This led to the name cushion pine. Some of its branches were very long and could not hold their own weight as such they were supported by bamboo stilts. Hokusai executed each branch and pine needles in a minute detail. He also placed picnickers in front of the pine. When he combined the Cushion-pine and Fuji, he appealed to the interests of the people. He made sure that he carried the intent throughout his work. He combined Mount Fuji with scenes of known places people had heard or always wanted to see.

This was the secret of Hokusai success in the Mt Fuji series. He was also able to convince a lot of people who would buy the prints. The people bought the prints as a way of viewing volcano. It led to the increase in the manufacturing of travel books such as woodblock prints inspired by interests in travel. Production of cushion pine normally used color woodblock print technique like Nishiki-e or woodblock print color blocks. The dimension of the frame is 20*26 m in mat and 19*25 sheet. Hokusai was the best-known artist and was highly influenced by western art like Dutch landscape and nature.

He influenced artists such as Whistler and Van Gogh. He was very talented in art since he was a young boy. Hokusai left over 30,000 works which include woodblock painting, picture books, travel illustrations, silk painting and many others. His most famous picture is seascape with Mt Fuji. The waves in that image form frames through which we see Mt Fuji in the distance.