Fishing Village, Flying Crane, and Mount Fuji

Description

This hanging scroll landscape painted by one of the foremost Japanese artists of the nineteenth century, Tani Buncho (1763–1840) and three of his followers, is an example of Japanese nanga (Southern paintings). Fishing Village, Flying Crane, and Mount Fuji is a rare collaborative effort, in which each artist has described and signed one section of a waterside fishing village with an awe-inspiring mountain in the distance.

Tani Buncho apparently started the painting at the bottom of the scroll, where tops of houses emerge from a rocky landscape by the shore. Painted in a spontaneous style, this portion of the composition is reminiscent of the works of both the Muromachi period artist Sesshu Toyo (1420–1506) and the Chinese artist Yujian (act. mid-13th century). A spit of land and sailboats in the water, suggested by the absence of ink, forms the next tier of the vertically composed landscape, and was painted by one of Buncho's most well-known pupils, the artist Bun'yo (1783–1852). The distant tall mountain that rises beyond the mist is suggestive of Mount Fuji, with its broad base and white irregularly shaped summit. Given the popularity of this theme in the nineteenth century, it is likely that this is indeed a painting of the sacred mountain. Strikingly, a delicately described white crane flies in front of the sun in the upper left corner. Painted in a soft red, the sun is the only color in the composition. This upper section of the painting was done by Buncho's son, Bunji (ca. 1812–1850) who was first recruited by Buncho to replace his brother, Bun'ichi, who had died from eating spoiled moss at a restaurant in 1818. The viewer is led to move through the landscape from Buncho's dramatically conceived rock forms and rooftops at the bottom to the red-colored sun at the top. There is no dated inscription on the painting, but from the careers of the artists, it can be roughly dated to between 1818 and 1840.

Tani Buncho was inspired by Chinese paintings. He was the son of a famous poet, Tani Rokkoku (1729–1809), who was also an artist in the service of the shogunal regent, Matsudaira Sadanobu. In addition to commissions for the regent, Tani Rokkoku also seems to have painted and designed book illustrations. Rokkoku worked in a number of different styles, but he is best known as the first nanga painter of the city of Edo (modern Tokyo).