Sakai Hōitsu ( ja, 酒井抱一; August 1, 1761 – January 4, 1829) was a

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

painter of the

Rinpa school is one of the major historical schools of Japanese painting. It was created in 17th century Kyoto by Hon'ami Kōetsu (1558–1637) and Tawaraya Sōtatsu (d. c.1643). Roughly fifty years later, the style was consolidated by brothers Ogata Kōrin ...

. He is known for having revived the style and popularity of

Ogata Kōrin Ogata Kōrin ( ja, 尾形光琳; 1658 – June 2, 1716) was a Japanese landscape illustrator, lacquerer, painter, and textile designer of the Rinpa School. Kōrin is best known for his ''byōbu'' folding screens, such as '' Irises'' and ' ...

, and for having created a number of reproductions of Kōrin's work.

Biography

Sakai Hōitsu was born on 1 August 1761 in Edo. His father was the lord (''daimyō'') of

Himeji Castle is a hilltop Japanese castle complex situated in the city of Himeji which is located in the Hyōgo Prefecture of Japan. The castle is regarded as the finest surviving example of prototypical Japanese castle architecture, comprising a network o ...

in Harima Province. The Sakai daimyō clan originated in

Mikawa Province was an old province in the area that today forms the eastern half of Aichi Prefecture. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Mikawa''" in . Its abbreviated form name was . Mikawa bordered on Owari, Mino, Shinano, and Tōtōmi Provinces. Mi ...

. They claim descent from Minamoto no Arichika. Arichika had two sons: one of them, Yasuchika, took the name of Matsudaira; and the other son, Chikauji, took the name of Sakai, and this is the ancestor of the Sakai clan. Sakai Hirochika, the son of Chikauji, had two sons as well; and the descendants of these two sons gave rise to the two principal branches of the clan.Papinot, Jacques. (2003)
''Nobiliare du Japon – Sakai''
pp. 50–51; Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon.'' (in French/German). A cadet branch of the Sakai is composed of the descendants of Sakai Masachika, who was a vassal of the Tokugawa – Nobutada, Kiyoyasu et Hirotada. In 1561, Masachika was installed at

Nishio Castle is a Japanese castle located in the city of Nishio, eastern Aichi Prefecture, Japan. At the end of the Edo period, Nishio Castle was home to the Ogyu Matsudaira, ''daimyō'' of Nishio Domain. The castle was also known as , , or . History Nish ...

in Mikawa province, and the security of the castle was confided in him. In 1590, Sakai Shigetada, the son of Masachika, received the domain of Kawagoe in Musashi Province (15,000 ''koku''); then in 1601, he was installed at Umayabashi in Kōzuke province (35,000 ''koku'').Papinot
p. 51.
/ref> In 1749,

Sakai Tadakiyo , also known as Uta-no-kami, Bodart-Bailey, Beatrice. (1999) ''Kaempfer's Japan: Tokugawa Culture Observed,'' p. 442./ref> was a ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) in Kōzuke Province, and a high-ranking government advisor and official in the Tokugawa shogu ...

(1626–1681) and his descendants were transferred to

Himeji 260px, Himeji City Hall is a city located in Hyōgo Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 525,682 in 227,099 households and a population density of 980 persons per km². The total area of the city is ...

in Harima Province (150,000 ''koku''); and they remained daimyō at Himeji until the

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

. Moving to

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin, Keihanshin metropolitan area along wi ...

, Hōitsu began his studies in art in the

Kanō school The is one of the most famous schools of Japanese painting. The Kanō school of painting was the dominant style of painting from the late 15th century until the Meiji period which began in 1868, by which time the school had divided into many di ...

before moving on to study under Utagawa Toyoharu of the

ukiyo-e Ukiyo-e is a genre of Japanese art which flourished from the 17th through 19th centuries. Its artists produced woodblock prints and paintings of such subjects as female beauties; kabuki actors and sumo wrestlers; scenes from history and folk t ...

style. He later studied under Watanabe Nangaku of the

Maruyama school Maruyama may refer to: * Maruyama (surname), a Japanese surname and list of people with the name * Maruyama, Chiba, a town in Japan * Maruyama Park in Kyoto * Mount Maru (disambiguation) Mount Maru may refer to: * Mount Maru (Esan), a volcano on ...

and

Sō Shiseki was a Japanese painter of the Nagasaki and Nanpin schools. Originally from Edo, he spent some time in Nagasaki, where he studied under the Chinese painter Song Ziyan, who was known as Sō Shigan in Japanese. The name Sō Shiseki is an art-name, ...

of the nanga style before finally becoming a painter of the

Hōitsu, citing poor health as a reason, became a Buddhist priest in 1797, and spent the last 21 years of his life in seclusion. During this time, he studied the work of Ogata Kōrin extensively, as well as that of Kōrin's brother

Ogata Kenzan , originally , and also known by the pseudonym Shisui, was a Japanese potter and painter. Biography Ogata Kenzan was born in Kyoto into a rich merchant family. His older brother was the painter Ogata Kōrin (1658–1716). Kenzan studied with t ...

, and produced a number of reproductions of the brothers' works. He also produced two books of

woodblock prints Woodblock printing or block printing is a technique for printing text, images or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later paper. Each page or image is crea ...

of the brothers' work, as well as one book of his own; these were titled ' (1815), ' (1823), and ' respectively. He died at the age of 66, on 4 January 1829, in Edo.

Style

Hōitsu's style shows elements of the realism of ukiyo-e, but resembles particularly the decorative style of Ogata Kōrin, which Hōitsu took major steps to revive. According to critic Robert Hughes, the core achievement in painting during the Edo period was the ''allusive and delicate work of the Rinpa artists;'' and in Hōitsu's large folding screen ''Flowers and Grasses of Summer and Autumn,'' he says, "you can almost feel the wind bending the rhythmical pattern of stems and leaves against their silver ground." In another screen, ''Flowering Plants of Summer,'' Hughes suggested that Hoitsu "possessed epigrammatic powers of observation," as demonstrated in another screen, ''Flowering Plants of Summer,'' in which "the fronds bend and bow under the summer rain, weaving a delicate lattice of green against the now tarnished silver ground." According to scholar Meccarelli the style used for painting vegetation was not faithful to ' or naturalism, but rather retook the ''flora'' and ''fauna'' decorative paintings of

Nanpin school The Nanpin school (南蘋派 ''Nanpin-ha'') was a school of painting which flourished in Nagasaki during the Edo period. Etymology The school takes its name from Nanpin, the art name of Chinese painter Shen Quan (1682–1760), an artist who pa ...

Works

is a pair of two-folded ''

byōbu are Japanese folding screens made from several joined panels, bearing decorative painting and calligraphy, used to separate interiors and enclose private spaces, among other uses. History are thought to have originated in Han dynasty C ...

'' folding screens made using ink and color on silver and gold-foiled paper. The work depicts plants and flowers from the autumn and summer seasons, and it is considered one of his best paintings. It was painted on the back of Kōrin's ''Wind God and Thunder God'' screens (show below), that Hōitsu's family owned. The monumental two-sided ''byōbu'' screens became a symbol of the Rinpa tradition, but both sides of the screens have since been separated to protect them from damage. Flowering Plants of Summer and Autumn''" mode="packed" heights="300px"> Summer and Autumn Flower Plants (left).jpg, Summer and Autumn Flower Plants (right).jpg, The screens measure 416.6 by 461.8 centimetres (164.5 in × 181.8 in) each. They are now part of the collection of the

Tokyo National Museum The or TNM is an art museum in Ueno Park in the Taitō ward of Tokyo, Japan. It is one of the four museums operated by the National Institutes for Cultural Heritage ( :ja:国立文化財機構), is considered the oldest national museum in Japan, ...

, where they are exhibited occasionally. They are an Important Cultural Property. is a pair of two-folded

screens Screen or Screens may refer to: Arts * Screen printing (also called ''silkscreening''), a method of printing * Big screen, a nickname associated with the motion picture industry * Split screen (filmmaking), a film composition paradigm in which m ...

made using ink and color on gold-foiled paper. They are an homage to both the original painting by

Tawaraya Sōtatsu was a Japanese furniture designer and painter of the Rinpa school. Sōtatsu is best known for his decorations of calligraphic works by his partner Hon'ami Kōetsu (1558–1637), and his spectacular and highly influential ''byōbu'' folding s ...

and Kōrin's later copy. The screens depicts

Raijin , also known as , , , and Kamowakeikazuchi-no-kami is a god of lightning, thunder and storms in Japanese mythology and the Shinto religion. He is typically depicted with fierce and aggressive facial expressions, standing atop a cloud, beatin ...

, the god of lightning, thunder and storms in the Shinto religion and in Japanese mythology, and

Fūjin or is the Japanese god of the wind and one of the eldest Shinto gods. He is portrayed as a terrifying wizardly demon, resembling a red-headed green-skinned humanoid wearing a leopard skin, carrying a large bag of winds on his shoulders. In Ja ...

, the god of wind. All three versions of the work were displayed together for the first time in seventy-five years in 2015, at the

Kyoto National Museum The is one of the major art museums in Japan. Located in Kyoto's Higashiyama ward, the museum focuses on pre-modern Japanese and Asian art. History The Kyoto National Museum, then the Imperial Museum of Kyoto, was proposed, along with the Impe ...

exhibition ''"Rinpa: The Aesthetics of the Capital"''. The screens now belong to the

Idemitsu Museum of Arts is an art museum located in the . History The museum was founded in 1966 and is administered as an incorporated foundation of . In 2000, , a branch of the museum, opened in , in . Collection The museum maintains a permanent collection cons ...

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, where they were last displayed from September 16 to November 5, 2017 in ''The Art of Edo Rimpa'' exhibition.

References

* Papinot, Jacques Edmund Joseph. (1906) ''Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie du japon.'' Tokyo: Librarie Sansaish
..Click link for digitized 1906 ''Nobiliaire du japon'' (2003)
* Roberts, Laurence P. (1976). ''A Dictionary of Japanese Artists.'' New York: Weatherhill Books. (cloth) -- eprinted by Floating World Editions, Warren, Connecticut, 2005. (paper)* McKelway, Matthew P. (2012). "Silver Wind: the Arts of Sakai Hoitsu." New York: Japan Society.

External links

* *

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

"Persimmon Tree,"
late autumn 1816 * Freer Gallery of Art
"Moon and Autumn Flowers"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sakai, Hoitsu 1761 births 1829 deaths Artists from Tokyo 18th-century Japanese painters 19th-century Japanese painters Rinpa school Buddhist artists Edo period Buddhist clergy Artists from Tokyo Metropolis