The Edo Period

The Edo (Tokugawa) Period (1603 - 1868)

After over a century of constant warfare in Japan, military dominance was finally achieved by Tokugawa Ieyasu with his victory at the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600, the largest battle in Japanese feudal history.

Kanō and Tosa Schools

Both the Kanō (specializing in kara-e – Chinese-style painting) and Tosa (specializing in yamato-e -- Japanese-style painting) schools of art, established during the Muromachi period, continued and expanded. A resurgent interest in classical art revitalized them. The Kanō school became the de facto "official" painting academy for Japan.

Kanō Tan'yu (1602 – 1674)

Tan'yu was the Tokugawa shōgunate's first official painter. He was one of the foremost painters in the entire history of the Kanō school, and many of the most famous and widely known Kanō works today were by Tan'yu.

This ink on paper painting, Scholar Viewing a Lake, was done sometime late in Tan'yu's life. The scholar in the painting is tiny. You can find him directly below the tree in the foreground.

Tosa Mitsuoki (1617 – 1691)

The Tosa school's reputation was fading when Mitsuoki became its head and moved it to Kyōto. Though Tosa school painters had traditionally been official painters for the Emperor's court, that position had recently been held by Kanō school painters. In 1654, Mitsuoki became the official court painter (edokoro azukari), restoring the Tosa school to its ancient status.

This 6-fold byōbu by Mitsuoki is one of a pair titled Flowering Cherry and Autumn Maples with Poem Slips. It was painted sometime in the 1654 to 1681 period.

Rinpa School

A new school of painting arose in the Edo period. It was not a formal school like the Kanō and Tosa schools. Rather it was something started by a pair of artists doing what they liked, followed by others who admired their work and used similar styles. The most common thread was a preference for decorative art and one particular painting technique, tarashikomi.

The partnership seems to have ended about 1620 when Sōtatsu chose to focus solely on painting. He went on to produce a series of remarkable works, one of the greatest of which was a byōbu depicting the Gods of Wind and Thunder.

Ogata Kōrin (1658 – 1716)

Born into a wealthy merchant family specializing in the design and sale of textiles, Kōrin was introduced to the arts by his father who was a skilled calligrapher in the style of Kōetsu. Though Kōrin studied with the Kanō school, he didn't establish himself as an artist until into his 4th decade. Later on, he had an opportunity to study earlier great works of art by Tōyō Sesshū (1420 – 1506) and others. Among his earliest works are several byōbu of irises, inspired by one of the poems in Ise Monogatari (Tales of Ise).

Another greatly admired work of Kōrin's is this pair of 2-fold byōbu, close copies of Sōtatsu's the Gods of Wind and Thunder.

Many Japanese artists, even in modern times, have been inspired by and made their own versions of these paintings.

Sometime subsequent to his death, the painting style begun by Sōtatsu and continued by Kōrin became known as the Rinpa school of art. The name is partly based on Kōrin's name.

Sakai Hōitsu (1761 – 1829)

Born the son of the daimyō of Himeji Castle in Harima Province, Hōitsu studied art in the Kanō school before switching to an ukiyo-e master. He later studied under other masters before finally settling for the Rinpa style of art.

The paintings below are a pair of 6-fold byōbu, titled Cherry and Maple Trees, which were painted in the 1820s. They demonstrate the tarashikomi painting technique developed by Sōtatsu and characteristic of the Rinpa school. It is the application of paint onto a previously painted, still wet surface. That is what produced the mottled look of the tree trunks in the paintings.

The influence of the Kanō and Tosa schools mostly faded away at the end of the Edo period, but the Rinpa school still influences Japanese artists today.

Other Edo Period Painters

There are many other Edo period painters of note, many of whom trained under one of the formal schools but later became independent and developed their own unique styles with varying influences on later painters. Among the best of these so called literati was ...

Itō Jakuchū (1716 – 1800)

The son of a grocer, Jakuchū managed the family business after the death of his father until the age of 40 when he turned the business over to his brother so that he could devote the rest of his life to art. Initially trained in the Kanō school, he became known as an eccentric painter with a bias toward natural subjects, preferring to paint from actual observation. He had a special liking for chickens and roosters.

Believed to have been done in his early 40s, this painting, Nandina (heavenly bamboo) and Rooster, is part of a series titled Colorful Realm of Living Beings.

Lacquerware

The use of lacquer in Japan dates back about 9,000 years ago during the Jōmon period. It was used both on pottery and various wooden items. Over the centuries, increasingly sophisticated techniques developed, most notably in the Heian period (794 – 1185) when several maki-e techniques were developed. Maki-e is the sprinkling of gold, silver, or copper powder over already painted lacquer designs before polishing, making them brighter than earlier techniques could achieve. Considerable amounts of Japanese lacquerware products were exported, inspiring admiration around the world.

The popularity of lacquerware products burgeoned during the Edo period. The Tokugawa clan commissioned many lacquer artisans, and their sponsorship attracted the attention of daimyō, too. There was an increase in the cultivation of lacquer trees and the further development of lacquer techniques.

This 17th century document box is embellished with seasonal motifs. The butterflies represent spring, and deer are symbols of autumn. The lid is decorated with an autumn landscape featuring large ferns.

Hon'ami Kōetsu and Ogata Kōrin brought Rinpa school designs to lacquerware. Kōrin used his famous yatsuhachi (8-bridges) iris design on this letter box.

This 19th century incense box is a testament to Kōrin's influence long after his death.

Traditional Japanese clothing had no pockets, so sagemono (objects hanging from an obi) were used. These might be coin purses, tobacco pouches, etc. One type of sagemono used for small objects was an inrō (seal basket), a segmented leather, wood, or paper container covered in lacquer and sometimes highly decorated. They were invented late in the 16th century for carrying seals, herbs, medicines, etc. A netsuke was an object attached to a cord running from the inrō. The netsuke was tucked under the obi to keep the inrō secure.

The netsuke in the photo above is fairly simple, but many were extremely elaborate, like the one below.

Ceramics

Wabi-sabi is a Japanese aesthetic that appreciates imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete beauty. Volumes can be written about it, but it is important for now to understand that it became an integral part of chanoyu, the Japanese tea ceremony, as it evolved in the decade before the start of the Edo period. Its influence was most obvious in the ceramic utensils used in chanoyu.

In the 1590s, the Japanese general, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, invaded Korea twice. He brought Korean potters back to Japan to produce ceramic items. The Koreans built a new type of kiln (noborigama or climbing kiln) that was far superior to the kilns used in Japan previously, allowing for greater precision during firing. Noborigama could have dozens of chambers, enabling high volume production.

Using the new kilns, the beginning of the Edo period was roughly when ceramic bowls called rakuware, or just raku, began to be produced based on wabi-sabi principles for use in chanoyu. It was lightweight glazed earthenware molded by hand rather than thrown on a potter's wheel. The clay is rough and unpretentious, covered in an opaque glaze.

Rakuware, or just raku, evolved, too. This raku tea bowl incorporates a crane design.

Major artists began to design ceramic items. Hon'ami Kōetsu, mentioned above in connection with Tawaraya Sōtatsu at the beginning of the Rinpa school, was one of them. Another was Ogata Kenzan (1663 – 1743), younger brother of Ogata Kōrin. Here is one of his tea bowls with a chrysanthemum design.

Kenzan worked with his brother to produce ceramics featuring some of Kōrin's simplified designs like this item titled Square Dish with Spring Flowers.

The discovery of clay containing kaolin, along with the high temperatures that noborigama were capable of, led to porcelain being produced in Japan for the first time early in the Edo period. This Dish with Parasol Ladies was produced in the 1735 to 1740 time frame. The design is an adaptation of a drawing by a Dutch Artist named Cornelis Pronk. (Remember the Dutch trading colony in Nagasaki harbor?) Pronk's original drawing featured ladies in Chinese dress, but the clothing style for this piece had been changed to Japanese styles.

This Figure of a Standing Beauty, produced in the 1670 to 1690 time period, is typical of popular collectibles exported from Japan to Europe in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.

End of the Edo Period

Over time, the Tokugawa shōgunate became politically weakened in spite of a number of changes made to shore up its strength. Then in 1853, United States' Commodore Mathew C. Perry sailed into Edo Bay with his fleet of black ships and modern weaponry and forced Japan to sign a treaty opening Japan to U.S. commerce. This is part of a contemporary Japanese scroll documenting the event.