Dulwich Picture Gallery shows Hokusai's complete Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji

This winter, one of the most famous images in the world is on display in a leafy corner of south London. Dulwich Picture Gallery is showing Hokusai: Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji from the Iuchi Collection, from 20 October 2026 to 17 January 2027.

The exhibition brings together Katsushika Hokusai's complete series of prints of Mount Fuji, made from 1831, including the celebrated The Great Wave. It is the first time the entire series has been shown together in the UK, and some of the prints have never been exhibited in this country before.

Despite its title, the series contains 46 prints rather than 36. Ten more were commissioned after the originals proved so popular, and all of them are here. Time Out notes that the series is rarely seen in its entirety outside Japan, and highlights its vivid pigments and the ukiyo-e woodblock techniques behind it.

The prints come from the Iuchi Collection, on deposit at the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo. Seeing them as a sequence lets visitors follow Hokusai's shifting views of the mountain across the whole series, something rarely possible outside Japan.

The setting makes the visit even more special. Dulwich Picture Gallery opened to the public in 1817 and is described as the oldest public art gallery in England. Its building was designed by the Regency architect Sir John Soane, and his skylit galleries went on to influence gallery architecture around the world.

The gallery's own story is remarkable. Its core collection was assembled by art dealers Noël Desenfans and Francis Bourgeois, originally for the King of Poland, but Poland was partitioned before it could be delivered. Bourgeois later bequeathed the collection to the College of God's Gift, the charity founded by Edward Alleyn, which led to the creation of the gallery in Dulwich.

Tickets for the Hokusai show can be booked on the gallery's website, which also has details of talks and events.

Dulwich Picture Gallery is on Gallery Road, Dulwich, SE21, a short walk from West Dulwich and North Dulwich stations. To book, visit dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk.