松下絵和歌巻断簡 (Matsu shita-e wakakan dankan)|Section of a Handscroll with Waka and Underpainting of Pines

Tawaraya Sōtatsu 俵屋宗達|Hon'ami Kōetsu 本阿弥光悦

early 17th century · Hanging scroll; ink on gold decorated paper · Asian Art

This detached section of a long poetry handscroll was remounted to serve as a self-sufficient calligraphic composition, with a single complete waka (31-syllable court verse) inscribed atop an abstract landscape of pine trees painted in gold. The calligraphy is in the distinctive style of Hon’ami Kōetsu, rendered in a dynamic yet ever so elegant array of “scattered writing” (chirashigaki) rhythmically composed in nine columns—some long, some comprising but a single character—that playfully regroups the 5-7-5-7-7 syllable structure of the poem into a new composition. The overall balance of this constellation of kanji and kana characters works well, with a focal point of the composition in the cluster of boldly inked characters “aki no tsuyu” 秋の露. These three characters reveal two other trademark features of Kōetsu’s hand. First, he has reversed the two parts of the character aki 秋、so that 火 is on the left, rather than 禾. Second, he has rendered the particle no in a highly cursive form of the phonetically equivalent character nō 濃, in order to make it as prominent as the kanji characters that precede and follow it. The anonymous poem is from Book 11, “Love,” of the Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern (Kokin wakashū, no. 545), and evokes the imagery of a woman crying into the sleeve of her robe, distraught over lost or unrequited love. It reads: ゆうされは いとゝひかたき わか袖に 秋の露さへ おきそはりつゝ Yū sareba itodo higataki wa ga sode ni aki no tsuyu sae okisawari-tsutsu As evening descends, it becomes ever harder to dry my tear-soaked sleeve, as the autumn dew also dampens it drop by drop. (Trans. John T. Carpenter)

Artist

Tawaraya Sōtatsu 俵屋宗達|Hon'ami Kōetsu 本阿弥光悦

Date

early 17th century

Medium

Hanging scroll; ink on gold decorated paper

Culture

Japan

Department

Asian Art

Credit line

Mary and Cheney Cowles Collection, Gift of Mary and Cheney Cowles, 2020