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1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

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Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#12
post #8

somebody explained me that the correct way to appreciate this painting is to invert it on horizontal axis. the reason is, japanese is read from right to left. once you invert it you can appreciate it better

Japanese characters are actually written left to right, but sometimes the page order is right to left. Writing that you might find on a website, e-mails, and scientific writing is typically actually written left to right. While these kinds of texts may have pages that are ordered from right to left, the text on the pages is typically written from left to right. It is typically only when text is written vertically (yo…

You are right, but it can be argued that during the time the painting was made, vertical writing was the predominant form, and I don't know whether horizontal writing was a thing at the time in Japan...

That said, as I implied in my other reply, the whole idea is a bit silly...

Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#13

somebody explained me that the correct way to appreciate this painting is to invert it on horizontal axis. the reason is, japanese is read from right to left. once you invert it you can appreciate it better

Doesn't this assume that people (in the west, at least) "perceive" paintings from left to right? That doesn't strike me as particularly true.

Look up “spatial agency bias” and “glance curve”

Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#15

somebody explained me that the correct way to appreciate this painting is to invert it on horizontal axis. the reason is, japanese is read from right to left. once you invert it you can appreciate it better

You mean like this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Great_Wave_off_Kanagawa_-...

His "Big Wave" has that right left position

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8d/Th...

Love the birds in this one, especially the way it mirrors the wave crest fingers. Hokusai seems to have lunch ved these birds. They figure in his caged Bird pieces.

Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#16

FYI, Hokusai also drew Hentai.

Sorry for the "actually", but Hentai didn't exist yet as a genre. It was "shunga", that is, erotic "ukiyo-e", a popular style at that time.

Popular shunga works by Hokusai are "Two lovers" or the wrongly translated "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife" (the original Japanese title is "female diver and octopus")

Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#19
post #10

somebody explained me that the correct way to appreciate this painting is to invert it on horizontal axis. the reason is, japanese is read from right to left. once you invert it you can appreciate it better

... specifically, Japanese is traditionally written top to bottom, then right to left. (In contrast, English is written left to right, then top to bottom.) So, armed with that knowledge, are you going to rotate it as well?

If you are talking about page order or panel order (in something like manga), those go right to left. More specifically, manga panels follow the usual western comic book panel order, except with left and right flipped.

However, when it comes to the actual text (regardless of the medium), it is always written either top to bottom or left to right. There is no right to left text writing in japanese. This isn't arabic, where text is indeed written right to left.

Re: 1-Bit Hokusai's "The Great Wave" (2023)

#20
post #8

somebody explained me that the correct way to appreciate this painting is to invert it on horizontal axis. the reason is, japanese is read from right to left. once you invert it you can appreciate it better

Japanese characters are actually written left to right, but sometimes the page order is right to left. Writing that you might find on a website, e-mails, and scientific writing is typically actually written left to right. While these kinds of texts may have pages that are ordered from right to left, the text on the pages is typically written from left to right. It is typically only when text is written vertically (yo…

When written horizontally it is now left to right but earlier you would see horizontal right to left. But vertical was preferred especially in the past.

You can see horizontal train stop signs written right to left in “In This Corner of the World” anime. Today all signage seems to be left to right.

[edit] The history section in Wikipedia explains that this was a postwar script reform. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_writing_system

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