Jeff Wall’s A Sudden Gust of Wind was created after Hokusai’s Ejira in
Suruga Provice in 1831. I noticed that A Sudden Gust of Wind has a
scene that looks a little less windy and that Wall’s version of this
work ignores the spiritual center of Hokusai’s work, Mount Fuji. Mount
Fuji is the highest mountain in Japan on Japan’s larges island. I am
very surprised that Wall left out this part of the piece because
Hokusai’s Ejira in Suruga Province is from his Thirty-six views of Mt.
Fuji collection completed in 1831.
When looking at Hokusai’s Ejira in Suruga Province I notice that
although Mount Fuji is supposed to be the focus and center of the
work, but it is hardly catching my eye. It is barely a line, so slight
that it could be a late addition to the work. Mount Fuji is a sacred
mountain, steeped in history and ringed by lakes and forests and has
for centuries been the traditional goal of pilgrimage. On the other
hand, the blades of grass, the scribes clinging to their hats, and
their modesty are much more detailed. Mount Fuji is in the distance,
and seems like a benign influence on the composition, like it could or
could not be included in the work.
The differences I notice between the pictures is obviously that Wall’s
work does not have Mount Fuji. I also noticed that Hokusai’s work is
drawn more like a cartoon while Wall’s is made of real life pictures
and although many different pictures were taken and arranged to make
this work come together, Wall’s work seems much more lifelike to me. I
think both works have a strange composition in many ways. It almost
seems, at first glance, that the works are too subtle. The trees are
off to the side so it is obvious it is not the center, and the paper
that the wind has ripped from the hands of the people and scattered
over the sky does not balance the canvas. The scene that both artists
have manipulated seem to suggest that we are seeing a snapshot in
time. A moment of real contemplation captured in a moment as time
itself stood still.
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