- Museum number
- 1979,1008,0.35
- Description
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Painting, hanging scroll. Mt Fuji and pines: in foreground four pines of Miho-no-Matsubara, with rounded shaped cluster of needles, arranged in mountain shape; in background Mt Fuji with its peak covered with snow. Ink and colour on silk, with ivory jikusaki. Signed and sealed.
- Production date
- 19thC(late)
- Dimensions
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Height: 146 centimetres (mount)
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Height: 34.50 centimetres
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Width: 86.30 centimetres (mount)
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Width: 68.50 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
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Clark 2001
The essence of Rinpa art, since its earliest expression by the painter Sotatsu (who worked about 1600-40) was stylish simplification, the distillation of certain key natural and literary motifs and their arrangement in a bold and elegantly decorative manner. The four pines here undoubtedly stand as emblems for the whole land-spit of Miho no Matsubara, and each cluster of needles is the same uniform, rounded shape. Seen as a whole group, the trees are arranged into a mountain shape that echoes the shape of Fuji. The technique used on the trunks and on the slopes of Mt Fuji of dropping colour onto areas of still-wet ink so that the two blend somewhat haphazardly ('tarashi-komi') was a hallmark trait of Rinpa painting. Comparison of Doitsu's composition with a fan painting attributed to Ogata Korin (1658-1716) of 'Mt Fuji and Pines' (Yuzo Yamane, Masato Naito, Timothy Clark, 'Rinpa Art from the Idemitsu Collection, Tokyo', London, British Museum Press, 1998, no. 25) painted almost two hundred years earlier, demonstrates the consistency of subject-matter and style of much Rinpa painting. Furthermore, the manner in which the Korin fan painting was later mounted as a hanging scroll amid pampas-grasses painted by Suzuki Kiitsu (1796-1858), reveals the reverential attitudes on which this was based.
Doitsu was the son of Yamamoto Sodo, a pupil of Sakai Hoitsu (1761-1828) who was responsible for reviving the Korin style in Edo in the early 19th century. Doitsu studied painting with another of Hoitsu's pupils, Nozaki Shin'ichi (1821-99) and ultimately succeeded as fourth-generation head of the Uge-an lineage (named after Hoitsu's studio), faithfully perpetuating the Rinpa style in the Meiji era (1868-1912).
Literature:
'Hizo Nihon bijutsu taikan'. vols. 3, Tokyo, Kodansha, 1993, no. 40 (commentary by Murashige Yasushi).
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Hizo Nihon bijutsu taikan Vol 3
Mt. Fuji is shown to the rear on the left of a horizontally rectangular space, with a few pine trees to the fore on the right symbolizing the celebrated pine groves of Miho (Miho-no-Matsubara). Mt. Fuji is given comparatively colorful treatment, the upper part being left white and the lower slopes done in ink wash mingled with blue and brown. 'Tarashi-komi' is used in applying the color, and there are other unusual touches such as the "dry-brush" brushwork and the use of curved lines. The pines, too, are given stylized mushroomlike shapes, the whole work creating a pronounced decorative effect.
Doitsu (1845-1913), the son of Yamamoto Sodo, a follower of Hoitsu, studied painting with Nozaki Shin'ichi and was responsible for carrying the Hoitsu style on into the Meiji period.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
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Exhibited:
2001, 11 May-29 Jul, BM Japanese Galleries, '100 Views of Mount Fuji'
- Acquisition date
- 1979
- Department
- Asia
- Registration number
- 1979,1008,0.35
- Additional IDs
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Asia painting number: Jap.Ptg.Add.605 (Japanese Painting Additional Number)