観瀑山水図|Landscape with Waterfall
Nakabayashi Chikutō
1841 · Hanging scroll; ink on paper · Asian Art
Chikutō painted this large landscape in the spirit of the Plum Blossom Daoist, the name given to the acclaimed Yuan-dynasty literati painter Wu Zhen (1280–1354). Chikutō’s diligent study of Chinese literati theory and technique, as expressed in printed treatises and manuals on painting, is evident here, particularly in his masterful rendering of the rocks using a combination of long, unaccented brushstrokes in pale, dry ink and staccato accents. Together with the darker horizontals of the distant pines and foliage, such brushwork derives from the visual vocabulary associated with Wu Zhen. Chikutō stated in a letter that this work would be his last large-scale landscape painting. Because of his advanced age (he was sixty-five at the time), the artist felt he could no longer continue to execute such large works, though he could still answer requests for plum and bamboo paintings, which required less complex details.
- Artist
- Nakabayashi Chikutō
- Date
- 1841
- Medium
- Hanging scroll; ink on paper
- Culture
- Japan
- Department
- Asian Art
- Credit line
- The Harry G. C. Packard Collection of Asian Art, Gift of Harry G. C. Packard, and Purchase, Fletcher, Rogers, Harris Brisbane Dick, and Louis V. Bell Funds, Joseph Pulitzer Bequest, and The Annenberg Fund Inc. Gift, 1975
