Ann Yonemura is senior associate curator of Japanese art at the Freer|Sackler.
Summer may find you yearning for a Japanese meal of cool, uncooked, fresh fish or shellfish prepared simply sliced as sashimi or with vinegared rice as sushi. Both methods of preparing fish have their roots in medieval Japan and have now gone global.
Whether you are new to the delicate flavors, colors, and textures of various fishes or a connoisseur who has mastered the Japanese names for your favorite selections, you will want to treat yourself to a visit to the Freer Gallery to see two galleries of paintings, ceramics, woodblock prints, and books illustrating Japanese fish (plus crabs and lobsters). Bountiful Waters: Aquatic Life in Japanese Art offers a rare opportunity to see all twenty of Utagawa Hiroshige’s famous series of fish prints, a best-seller when it was published in the 1830s and 1840s.
Among the 51 works of art on view are paintings and prints by Katsushika Hokusai (1760–1849), including a rare handscroll of miscellaneous color paintings and a masterly painting of crustaceans from Charles Lang Freer’s renowned collection. See if you can recognize fish from which your sushi is prepared, or compare the images of swimming and leaping carp by different artists. Learn about the importance of fish from the abundant fresh waters and seas of the Japanese islands and the cultural meanings of carp, eels, and sea bream—the fish served for holidays and celebrations.
Celebrate International Sushi Day and Go Fishing Day, both celebrated on June 18, with a visit to Bountiful Waters at the Freer. Curator Ann Yonemura will provide a short tour of the exhibition, which is on view through September 14, at 2 pm today.
