THE JAPAN NEWS


 

The government of Sumida Ward in Tokyo has started issuing a motorcycle license plate featuring works from ukiyo-e artist Katsushika Hokusai’s famous “Thirty-six views of Mt. Fuji” series of landscape prints. The move is to celebrate the Nov. 22 opening of the Sumida Hokusai Museum.

The plate design is a combination of Hokusai’s “Great Wave off the Coast of Kanagawa,” “Akafuji” (Mt. Fuji in red) and Tokyo Skytree.

Hokusai was born in Sumida Ward and is believed to have lived there. The ward government offered local junior high school students an opportunity to design the license plate before the opening of the museum, which is dedicated to the famed artist.

Out of 35 candidates, a design by Haruna Ando, a third-year student at Azumatachibana Junior High School, was chosen in a ballot by residents of the ward.

Two thousand license plates will be issued for motorcycles with 50cc or smaller engines that are owned by ward residents, or mainly used in the ward.

An official at the ward government’s tax section said, “We hope [people] travel inside and outside the ward with the license plate, communicating Sumida’s connection to Hokusai.”