IKE TAIGA
Further images
AB# 8624
IKE TAIGA (1723-1776)
Subject: Flowering plum tree with full moon
Signed: Heian Ike sha-i
Sealed: Ike Tsutomu [kin] no in; Kôbin [2]; Rankô suikei no aida wo shôyô su
Date: ca. 1745-48
Media: Finger painting, ink on paper
Dimensions: 53 1/2 x 22 7/8 in.
Format: Hanging scroll
Price: $ 78,000
As a member of the second generation of literati painters in Kyoto, IKE TAIGA is celebrated for seamlessly combining classical Chinese aesthetics and techniques with those of traditional Japanese painting. In his twenties, Taiga experimented with the then-popular Chinese practice of finger painting (shitoga), a technique that used parts of the hand, fingertips, and fingernails to create shadings and strokes not feasible with a brush. He may have been inspired to do so by his supporter and mentor, the Chinese painting connoisseur Yanagisawa Kien (1706-58) who is said to have originated this practice in Japan. Taiga was so adept at this novel technique that he received numerous commissions from important figures when visiting Edo in 1748. Here in this early work from his first decade as a professional artist, Taiga accentuates the massive trunk of the ancient plum tree with bold punctuated dark-ink rapid finger painting while the small blossoms are finely and more precisely articulated. The wet wash indicating the night sky pushes the unpainted moon to the attention of the viewer.
Painted by brush rather than hand, a dramatic pair of six-fold screens depicting old plum trees in the mist in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum Art (see Fischer, cat. no. 38) illustrate the artist’s confident mastery of the brush but also contrasts pooled ink with heavy dark ink for the tree, leaving the center of the trunk unpainted. The plum, a symbol of reclusiveness and purity, was one of the Four Gentlemen’s ink painting subjects according to Chinese tradition. It is a surprisingly rare subject in Taiga’s oeuvre.
For a few other examples besides those cited above see:
Hôan Kosugi, ed., Ike Taiga sakuhinshû [The Works of Ike no Taiga] (Tokyo: Chuo koron bijutsu shuppan, 1960), catalogue numbers: 93, 99 (both early finger paintings but less impressive works), 303 and 461 (which are both later works).
For the same three seals see:
Felice Fischer, Ike Taiga and Tokoyama Gyokuran; Japanese Masters of the Brush, (Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2007), appendix 2 p. 486: s 22: cat. nos 15, 18, 20, 21, 22, and 23; s 28 cat. 22, 23; s. 31, cat. 23, 83.
All three seals appear together on cat. no. 23 pp. 142-43 that is a pair of screens dated to the fifth month of 1749 titled “Two Excursions to Red Cliff.”
Literature
As a member of the second generation of literati painters in Kyoto, IKE TAIGA is celebrated for seamlessly combining classical Chinese aesthetics and techniques with those of traditional Japanese painting. In his twenties, Taiga experimented with the then-popular Chinese practice of finger painting (shitoga), a technique that used parts of the hand, fingertips, and fingernails to create shadings and strokes not feasible with a brush. He may have been inspired to do so by his supporter and mentor, the Chinese painting connoisseur Yanagisawa Kien (1706-58) who is said to have originated this practice in Japan. Taiga was so adept at this novel technique that he received numerous commissions from important figures when visiting Edo in 1748. Here in this early work from his first decade as a professional artist, Taiga accentuates the massive trunk of the ancient plum tree with bold punctuated dark-ink rapid finger painting while the small blossoms are finely and more precisely articulated. The wet wash indicating the night sky pushes the unpainted moon to the attention of the viewer.
Painted by brush rather than hand, a dramatic pair of six-fold screens depicting old plum trees in the mist in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum Art (see Fischer, cat. no. 38) illustrate the artist’s confident mastery of the brush but also contrasts pooled ink with heavy dark ink for the tree, leaving the center of the trunk unpainted. The plum, a symbol of reclusiveness and purity, was one of the Four Gentlemen’s ink painting subjects according to Chinese tradition. It is a surprisingly rare subject in Taiga’s oeuvre.
For a few other examples besides those cited above see:
Hôan Kosugi, ed., Ike Taiga sakuhinshû [The Works of Ike no Taiga] (Tokyo: Chuo koron bijutsu shuppan, 1960), catalogue numbers: 93, 99 (both early finger paintings but less impressive works), 303 and 461 (which are both later works).
For the same three seals see:
Felice Fischer, Ike Taiga and Tokoyama Gyokuran; Japanese Masters of the Brush, (Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2007), appendix 2 p. 486: s 22: cat. nos 15, 18, 20, 21, 22, and 23; s 28 cat. 22, 23; s. 31, cat. 23, 83.
All three seals appear together on cat. no. 23 pp. 142-43 that is a pair of screens dated to the fifth month of 1749 titled “Two Excursions to Red Cliff.”