, also known as Kikuchi Takeyasu and Kawahara Ryōhei, 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 most famous for his monochrome portraits of historical figures.
Biography
The son of a
samurai
The samurai () were members of the warrior class in Japan. They were originally provincial warriors who came from wealthy landowning families who could afford to train their men to be mounted archers. In the 8th century AD, the imperial court d ...
named Kawahara of
Edo
Edo (), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo.
Edo, formerly a (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the '' de facto'' capital of Japan from 1603 as the seat of the Tokugawa shogu ...
, he was adopted by a family named
Kikuchi. When eighteen, he became a pupil of
Takata Enjō; but, after studying the principles of the
Kanō,
Shijō, and Maruyama schools, perhaps, under Ozui, a son of
Ōkyo, he developed an independent style, having some affinities with that of
Tani Bunchō.
His illustrated history of Japanese heroes, the ''
Zenken Kojitsu
The is a collection of biographies of Japanese historical figures by Kikuchi Yōsai, first published from the late Edo period into the Meiji period. It consists of ten volumes and twenty books in total. Moving through time from Classical antiqui ...
'', is a remarkable specimen of his skill as a draughtsman in monochrome ink.
In order to produce this work, and his many other portraits of historical figures, he performed extensive historical, and even archaeological, research. ''Zenken Kojitsu'' features over 500 major figures in Japanese history, and was originally printed as a series of ten
woodblock printed books, in 1878.
Style
Nakane Kōtei (中根 香亭) pointed out that Yōsai modelled the form of ''
Zenken Kojitsu
The is a collection of biographies of Japanese historical figures by Kikuchi Yōsai, first published from the late Edo period into the Meiji period. It consists of ten volumes and twenty books in total. Moving through time from Classical antiqui ...
'' (前賢故実) on ''Wanxiaotang Zhuzhuang Huachuan'' (晩笑堂竹荘画伝) which was drawn by the
Qing
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...
illustrator . Kōtei also said that Yōsai was influenced by
Hokusai
, known mononymously as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. His woodblock printing in Japan, woodblock print series ''Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji'' includes the iconic print ''The Gr ...
when young. He thought of the calligraphy as much as the picture when he guided a pupil.
Notes
References
*
* - facsimile of works.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kikuchi, Yosai
1788 births
1878 deaths
19th-century Japanese painters
Painters from Tokyo
Buddhist artists
Japanese portrait painters
People from Musashi Province
People of the Edo period
People of the Meiji era