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- Getting up close and personal with the researchers -

The literati paintings that I am researching originally refer to paintings created by the intellectual class, such as shidaifu (bureaucrats), during the Tang and Song dynasties in China. Although they were created by amateurs, not professional artists, they are works of art consisting of poetry, calligraphy, and paintings, backed by the rich culture unique to the intellectual class. Many of the Chinese bureaucrats of the time served the nobility with aspirations, but found themselves at odds with one another and ended up withdrawing from the political arena. The world of literati painting, which they became absorbed in as a sort of escape from reality, can be said to have been an art form that expressed their sense of frustration and regret.

Literati painting eventually made its way to Japan, spreading mainly in Kyoto in the mid-Edo period. Literati painting was a place where educated people from all walks of life, including Confucian scholars, painters, Chinese poets, and haiku poets, all of whom were fascinated by China, gathered together to enjoy Chinese artworks while enjoying the tea ceremony and sake, and eventually began to imitate them and produce their own Chinese poetry and paintings. Literati painting, which originated in China, blossomed as a rich pastime in Japan's cultural salons.

There are many Japanese literati paintings that make the viewer burst into laughter. Unlike Chinese literati paintings that depict the twisted spirituality of bureaucrats, Japanese literati paintings were seen as a free form of expression in ink painting, and many masterpieces were born from the conversations of intellectuals filled with intellectual curiosity. The Zen teaching of "hahaha daisho," or laughing, clears the mind and dispels evil thoughts, and this generous spirit flows through Japanese literati paintings.

I have been studying Ike Taiga (1723-1776) for many years, one of the great masters of literati painting representing the Edo period. Even in a single painting, such as "Gourd and Catfish" (owned by Idemitsu Museum of Arts), in which a catfish is being crushed with a gourd, you can sense a generous spirit of laughter. The original was "Gourd and Sweetfish" (owned by Taizoin) painted by Josetsu, a painter-monk at Shokoku-ji Temple, in response to a Zen riddle asking, "How can you hold down a slimy catfish with a round, smooth gourd?" Taiga responded by painting a huge gourd being placed on top of the catfish and pressed down on it, as if to say, "If you can't catch it, just crush it." The Chinese poem accompanying the painting was written by Monk Daiten, who was also Taiga's patron, and quotes Zhuangzi, saying, "Humans wish for things that cannot come true, but the true purpose lies in this uselessness." One can imagine that Taiga and the monk were laughing together as they collaborated on this project. Furthermore, Taiga's signature is written in a unique, broken style that echoes the taut whiskers of a catfish. It is said that Taiga sometimes painted with his fingers instead of a brush in pursuit of interesting lines, and the interest of literati painting lies in its deviation from the traditional techniques of art, showing that it is an art created by a free imagination that is not found in professional painters.

I first encountered Ike Taiga's work when I was studying Japanese art history at graduate school. When I saw Taiga's "Royal Palace Landscape Screen" at the Tokyo National Museum, where I had been to see Maruyama Okyo's work, I was struck by the sensation of being caught in the swell of a wave. It was the first time I had "experienced" a painting, rather than just "watching" it. From then on, I became immersed in Taiga's research, and spent three years studying in the UK as a fellow at the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures. I was also given a position at the British Museum, where I was involved in research on Japanese art and exhibition planning of literati paintings. In Japan, I was buried under a mountain of literature on Taiga and could not write a thesis as I wanted, but in the UK, I came into contact with researchers in various fields of "Japanese studies" such as religion, history, maps, and literature, and I realized once again that "my research theme is visual art. I should face the work itself, not the literature or materials."

So I decided to visit the site to understand Taiga's painting of the Chinese landscape, "Spring Scene at West Lake/Tide-Watching at Qiantang Screen." If you climb Fenghuang Mountain, you can get a panoramic view of the Qiantang River and West Lake, and it is believed that the poem about West Lake by Su Shi, a literary figure and politician from the Northern Song Dynasty in China, "Drinking the Lake in the First Clear Weather, Later Rain (West Lake is Beautiful Whether it is Sunny or Rainy)," was written at the top of Fenghuang Mountain. It has been discovered that Taiga may have used this as a hint when he painted "Spring Scene at West Lake" shrouded in drizzle. Furthermore, in the "Qiantang Tide Viewing Screen," the tidal storm caused by the gravitational pull of the moon is depicted in rainbow colors, which corresponds to a line from Su Shi's poem "August 15th, Viewing the Five Perfect Scenes of the Tide," in which he writes, "The force with which the god of the sea surges from the east is powerful, spewing out mist." (In Chinese poetry, "mist" means rainbow.) Fascinated by travel and mountain climbing from a young age, Taiga applied the techniques for observing scenery he had developed there to create the majestic landscapes of China, which he had never actually seen, inspired by various woodblock prints and Chinese poetry.

"Spring Scenery of Lake West and Qiantang Viewing the Tide Screen" by Ike Taiga, Edo period, owned by Tokyo National Museum

(Source: National Museum Collection Integrated Search System https://colbase.nich.go.jp/collection_items/tnm/A-1195?locale=ja)

It is said that in his later years, while bedridden, the Chinese landscape painter Sohei enjoyed painting landscapes while recalling the scenery he had walked through in his life. Taiga could be said to have given intellectuals of the time the pleasure of "imaginary travel" through his literati paintings. It may be something like what we would call "virtual travel" today, but he incorporated various mechanisms that allowed viewers to experience an infinitely expanding journey within a single painting.

In fact, some have pointed out that Taiga's creativity overlaps with that of 19th century impressionist painters. In 1957, the Paris art newspaper L'Art published a story that compared the paintings of post-impressionist painter Seurat and Taiga, discussing the similarities between their pointillism techniques. However, whereas Seurat's pointillism was backed by optical knowledge, Taiga's was a simple technique acquired from nature. It is said that when Taiga was creating masterpieces such as folding screen paintings, he would spread white sand outside his house and create his works under the pouring sunlight. It is thought that pointillism, which expresses shifting light, was born from this environment, and it is astonishing that he had acquired this technique 100 years before the impressionist painters.

Yosa Buson (1716-1783), famous as a haiku poet, was also known for his talent as a literati painter. One of his masterpieces is the National Treasure "Colored Towers at Night." It has only recently been discovered that the inscription on this painting is based on a poem written by Chinese Ming Dynasty literati Li Panlong while admiring the scenery of a Chinese tower and thinking about a friend who had resigned from his government post due to illness and returned to his hometown. Based on a poem that also contains the thoughts of Li Panlong, a scholarly man who was bad at dealing with people and worried about his friend, Buson has transformed a Chinese tower, the center of cold and harsh politics, into a warm urban snowy landscape at the foot of Higashiyama in Kyoto.

It has also been pointed out that on closer inspection, the vermilion-painted walls and the second-floor room with its flickering lanterns resemble a Japanese brothel with its open lattice doors. At the time, Buson called the teahouses in Shimabara "Snow Towers" and was apparently very infatuated with the geisha Koito, so people who saw this painting may have been grinning to themselves as they imagined Buson enjoying a drink with Koito on the second floor while looking at the snow.

"National Treasure: A View of a Tower at Night" / Yosa Buson, Edo period, private collection

(Reprinted from the exhibition catalogue for "Elegant Edo Paintings: The Fascinating 18th Century" (Idemitsu Museum of Arts, 2018))

Literature paintings are interwoven with a variety of mechanisms, such as words, pictures, the relationship between words and pictures, and what is not depicted, making it endlessly fascinating to interpret them. There are probably no other works of art that are as profound as these as research subjects. Knowing the background of the work's creation can provide clues for interpreting the work, but there is no clear "correct" answer, and the freedom to allow viewers to interpret it however they like is also one of the broad-minded aspects of literati paintings. The journey of exploration into literati paintings, whose mysteries deepen even after interpretation, will continue.

My grandfather, Sazo Idemitsu (1885-1981), founder of Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd., is known to many as the model for the character in the recently made-to-film The Man Called Pirate, but he was also known for his devotion to Japanese art, including that of Sengai (1750-1837), and for collecting numerous works. In 1966, the Idemitsu Museum of Arts opened based on this collection, and I was appointed its third director in April 2019.

Sengai, whose work captivated Sazo, was the head priest of Hakata Shofukuji Temple and was famous for his style of work that expressed Zen teachings in an easy-to-understand and humorous way. Sengai's "Shigetsu Hotei Gasan," the first piece in the Idemitsu Collection, features a children's song "How many moons, thirteen and seven," and depicts a child raising his hands in joy, which is said to be an exhortation to Zen teachings. Sazo often used this painting as a warning to his employees. For a Zen monk, reading a sutra is like looking at the tip of a finger, and it is important to realize the truth that lies beyond. In other words, he said, don't just look at the tip of Hotei's finger, but look at the "unpainted moon" that must be beyond it.

"Shigetsu Hotei Painting Praise" by Sengai, Edo period, owned by Idemitsu Museum of Arts

Well, the spread of the COVID-19 virus occurred just one year after I became director. Museums, art exhibitions, and art events in Japan and abroad have been forced to cancel or postpone, and Idemitsu Museum of Arts was also forced to close. I think many people involved with the art world are now trying to figure out what museums can do to combat the anxiety and fear of an unknown virus.

This brings to mind the Tohoku traveling exhibition that Etsuko and Joe Price, a couple of famous American art collectors, organized to encourage people in the disaster-stricken areas immediately after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. This exhibition, which featured Ito Jakuchu's "Birds, Animals, Flowers and Trees Screen" (currently owned by Idemitsu Museum of Arts), a representative piece of the Price Collection, healed the hearts of the people in the disaster-stricken areas who were hurt and devastated. That year, Idemitsu Museum of Arts held an exhibition titled "Taiga, Buson, Gyokudō and Sengai - The Heart of Laughter." Wanting to cheer up people who were feeling down due to the self-restraint mood, the subtitle "The Heart of Laughter" was added, and many visitors enjoyed the exhibition. Artworks have a mysterious power to heal and liberate people's hearts. This incident reminded me of that fact. In recent years, the Idemitsu Museum of Arts has added parts of the Price Collection, including this "Birds, Animals, Flowers and Trees Screen," as new collections, and I believe that the museum will have a major role to play in the future.

Exhibition flyer for "Taiga, Buson, Gyokudō and Sengai - The Spirit of Laughter"

It is currently difficult to have many people view actual artworks, but the art world is considering new ventures such as virtual museums. However, just as when I first encountered Taiga, I still believe that it is important to see the actual work of art and "experience" it. By feeling the movement and pressure of the brush, the artist's heart is directly conveyed. I believe this will be a valuable and rare "experience" for that person. (Published September 2020)