An Introduction to the History of JapanHara, Katsuro
History
An Introduction to the History of Japan
Hara, Katsuro
Japan -- History
In painting also, the most important progress of the age is the change
in subjects of this art, or rather the increase in varieties of subjects
to be painted. Before this time what the artists generally liked to
paint were the images of Buddha, Buddhist deities, scenes in Buddhist
history, and portraits of celebrated priests. Landscapes were put on
canvas, too, though not so frequently as those subjects pertaining to
Buddhism. Since then portraits, not only of priests, but also of laymen,
such as courtiers and generals, have been treated by our painters. Some
masterpieces of the new portraiture, by the brush of Takanobu, are
extant to this day. This development of portrait-painting may be
interpreted as a symptom of the newly-budding individualism on the
nation. As to scroll paintings, formerly we had pictures of consecutive
scenes in Buddhist history painted in that manner, but scenes from
secular history or genre pictures were rare. From this time onward we
have scrolls of a character not purely religious, though Buddhist
stories are still used as subjects for painting as before. Moreover, in
earlier scrolls the best attention was paid to painting Buddha or
deities, and not to delineating the auxiliaries, such as landscapes,
buildings, worshipping multitudes of various professions, and so forth,
while in the new kinds of scrolls more stress was laid on depicting
those auxiliaries rather than the pious personages themselves. Battle
scenes in the provinces of Mutsu and Dewa, or those between the Taira
and the Minamoto in the streets of Kyoto, were also painted on scrolls.
Another and quite novel kind extant of the scroll pictures of this age
is the satirical delineation of the manners and customs of the time by
the brush of the painter-priest Toba-sojo. In the famous scroll certain
animals familiar to the daily life, such as foxes, rabbits, frogs, and
so forth are depicted allegorically, each suggesting certain notorious
personages of various callings in the contemporary society.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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