Emperor Enyū’s Outing to Funaokayama on the First Day of the Rat in the New Year

This composition in ink with touches of light color depicts the 10th century Emperor Enyū and his entourage on an outing from Kyoto to the mountain of Funaokayama—an ancient reference point for the northerly direction—in the New Year. The work, created with soft brushstrokes and wash for the landscape elements and finer ink lines for the figures, has deliberate stylistic antecedents in the yamato-e style of narrative painting from the twelfth through fourteenth centuries, in the late Heian and Kamakura periods. The courtiers, robed in either black or white and sporting the usual tall, lacquered courtier’s caps, are scattered throughout the composition; two carriages (of the ox-drawn type used by aristocrats) stand in the foreground.

The artist, Tamechika, is as fascinating as his paintings. He was an important painter of the final decades of the Edo period, and influential in the revival of the classical yamato-e style of painting and narrative illustration. He produced numerous copies of medieval paintings in order to re-introduce their styles to the public, and venerated the courtly lifestyle of the ancient past. Due to the volatile political climate of the final years of shogunal power, just prior to the re-establishment of imperial sovereignty, Tamechika’s social connections with both imperial courtiers and military lords in service to the shogun led to his assassination by a band of warriors near Nara.