著者

綿田 稔

雑誌

美術研究 = The bijutsu kenkiu : the journal of art studies

巻号頁・発行日

no.405, pp.25-46, 2012-01-13

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Sesshû Tâyô (1420-1502/06?) was a Zen monk who painted during the latter half of the 15th century, during Japan's Muromachi period. Labeled a painting master and a painting great in Japan today, our previous understanding of Sesshû has been little more than a tentative analysis, framed in the limited image of the modern “artist.” This is true to the extent that there are no records today that give us a definitive answer about how Sesshû or his paintings were understood by his contemporaries. In order to create a more realistic evaluation of this painter, we must first examine the known facts behind his rale. As such, in this case, all we have are Sesshû's actual remaining works. Indeed, the extant works are nothing more than a fragment of his full output. The oeuvre does not tell us about Sesshû the artist or Sesshû the man. Indeed our understanding of Sesshû himself is but a rough sketch, given that the information remaining about him is quite fragmentary. Imagining a whole from these few and disparate parts can provide some feedback on that fragmentary understanding. This then enriches the overall image, and in turn, enriches our understanding. In this process we can become aware of fragments that had not been previously acknowledged. Different viewpoints are linked at unexpected places and gradually that which is grasped of the entirety grows. In this process it is necessary to reposition, redefine individual facts, whether his paintings or even Sesshû himself. This article is such a study, and there is the impression that at last certain of the fragments are linked up. Then, advancing from the process of individual proof, I would like to advance to the stage of gathering up the fragments while considering the entire image. This article attempts to position Sesshû as one of the countless kanga-shi (Chinese-like style painters, or painters who were of military class background who painted in a Chinese-like style), who existed across the history of Japan. This process will reconsider the Handscroll of Landscape of the Four Seasons (also known simply as the Long Landscape Scroll, dated to the 12th month of 1486, Mohri Museum), from the vantage point of a kanga-shi painter. In fact, historical documents exist that suggest that around the spring of 1487 Sesshû painted landscapes in the style of Xia Gui on the shôji sliding door panels for Ôuchi Masahiro (1446–1495). This evidence of Sesshü's actual role as a kanga-shi painter can also clarify the meaning of the Long Landscape Scroll, a work painted immediately before the Ôuchi work and one consisting of landscapes in the Xia Gui style. Undoubtedly, around the time when Sesshû was painting the Long Landscape Sscroll, he would have had a variety of information regarding the paintings of the Chinese Southern Song painter Xia Gui that he would have received from the Ôuchi family that commissioned the shôji works. This would have added to the knowledge Sesshû already had of Xia Gui style, and would have lead to the creation of the Long Landscape Scroll, which acted as a gahon (pictorial model) of Xia Gui's landscape style, a tool for his painting studio. Rather than just Sesshû's own self-determination, it would be closer to the truth to say that Ôuchi Masahiro ordered Sesshû to make such gahon, expecting it would be a tool for use by the next generation. In addition to the Long Landscape Scroll, there are several other extant works that could be considered pictorial models for Sesshû. And indeed, the majority of extant Sesshû works fall into this gahon category, and Sesshû is not unique in this regard. These materials can be considered the best tool for us today to reconsider Sesshû in his true historical perspective as a kanga-shi painter, the system in which he worked and the pictures he produced within those conditions.