Illustrations of Uji Tea Production

This folding album was originally created as handscroll, about a foot tall and over fifty feet long, capturing in remarkable detail every stage of production of deluxe green tea in Uji, near Kyoto. The imagery starts in the early spring and charts each stage of growing, harvesting, culling the best leaves, and drying of the tea leaves. The final scene shows a group of men enjoying bowls of tea. Even to this day, Uji is famous for its variety of teas used for both tea ceremony and everyday imbibing. As early as the thirteenth century, by which time the consumption of tea was becoming more common in Japan, tea growers discovered that the quality of the soil as well as the local climate in Uji made for ideal conditions for tea cultivation. The various types of tea enjoyed in Japan since medieval times, whether matcha¸ sencha, ūroncha (Oolong tea), bancha, hōjicha (roasted tea), genmaicha (brown rice tea), gyokuro (deluxe shade-grown green tea) are all made from the same Camellia Sinensus plant, though various subspecies have been cultivated over the years. The variations in taste, appearance, and texture depends on what time of year the leaves are harvested, whether they are fermented or not, and then how they are dried and processed.

Nothing is known about the painter, identified in the Preface as Saitō Motonari 斎藤玄就 (pronunciation unsure) except that he lived in Uji. A single-page preface to the scroll in literary Chinese was boldly brushed by the monk Nindō Sōen 忍道宗延of Daitokuji Temple in Murasakino, Kyoto. Sōen was the fourteenth head abbot of Hōshun’in, 芳春院 a subtemple in the northern precincts of Daitokuji, and a noted practitioner of wabicha tea ceremony. He notes that he is a friend of Saitō Motonari, the painter of this handscroll. Sōen notes that the special quality of tea produced in Uji is due to the way the tea bushes are shaded while growing.

An almost identical scroll, except that it lacks captions, was exhibited at the Urasenke Chadō Shiryō-kan in Kyoto in 2021. That scroll, which features the title “Illustrations of Uji Tea Picking and Tea Production” (Uji tekicha oyobi teisaku no zu) was painted by Matsushita Sakae and is dated Meiji 29 (1896),and must have been copied from this earlier version. See http://5106.jp/japanese-tea/6671/

The album can be described as follows:

1. Cover with the hand-brushed title slip “Illustrations of Uji Tea Production” (Uji sei-cha no zu 宇治製茶之図)
2. A single-page preface to the scroll brushed by the monk Sōen 宗延 from Daitokuji Temple in Murasakino, Kyoto. He notes that he is a friend of the artist Saitō Motonari 斎藤玄就 (pronunciation unsure) who painted this handscroll of scenes of tea production. The opening two characters are read Uji 菟道, though today 宇治is the standard way to write the place name. Sōen notes that the special quality of tea produced in Uji is due to the way the tea bushes are shaded while growing. The preface is dated to the kigai cyclical year of the Kyōwa era (1803).
3. The opening illustration features a large, roofed gateway to the tea plantation.
4. Preparations are already underway in the first lunar month with workers weaving the reed matting that will be used to carry out the “shaded cultivation” (oishita saibai) distinctive to Uji tea since the late sixteenth century.
5. Bamboo baskets of various sizes are woven
6. From the beginning of the second month, the large blankets used for collecting, spreading, and cooling the tea leaves are repaired.
7. Bamboo used to support the reed canopies is carried in from huts in the fields around the time cherry trees bloom.
8. Bamboo scaffolding to support the reed canopies (yoshizu) is erected over the young tea bushes in the third month. According to the caption here, the first picking of young tea takes place eighty-eight nights after the end of winter and this early crop produces the highest quality tea.
9. Reed canopies are being installed to slow the photosynthesis process and thereby reduce the bitterness of the tea.
10. Paper markers are tied to tea bushes to indicate which should be harvested first.
11. During the rainy season, groups of women tea pickers wear raincoats made from reeds (mino).
12. Men transport the tea leaves in large baskets hoisted upon their shoulders.
13. Agricultural supervisors (nobugyō) of the Shogunate check harvest records, while women are harvesting tea during a short period of time in the early summer. Some of the women carry their children on their backs.
14. Women pause in picking tea to watch a group of samurai officials pass by.
15. A procession of a samurai family.
16. Harvested tea leaves are brought to the tea processing building in large baskets.
17. Tea leaves are brought indoors where, under the supervision of the owner, they are weighed and transferred to “cooling baskets” (suzushi kago).
18. Leaves are spread on large tables where women remove stems and other impurities.
19. Leaves undergo a steaming process.
20. A clerk sitting beside a Japanese clock controls the timing, and the leaves are returned to their baskets where women waving fans cool the trays of leaves, while samurai officials look on.
21. An accountant checks and tallies the number of trays.
22. Wet leaves are spread on large blankets and dried over large roasting trays (ho-iro).
23. Leaves are constantly moved to ensure an even drying process.
24. Bales of wood are unpacked and thrown onto the furnaces where the tea leaves are roasted.
25. Leaves are spread out again in order to let them cool down before being transferred into large tea jars. A clerk records everything in an account book.
26. Empty baskets and trays are gathered and taken apart up in a process called “basket breaking” (kago yaburi). The baskets will be refurbished or made anew in the new year.
27. Male workers carry the empty trays and disassembled baskets away to storage, as trays of precious tea leaves are brought to be examined.
28. Examination of tea leaves on black lacquer trays by bespectacled quality control experts.
29. Large groups of women squatting around tables meticulously sort the tea then present their work on black lacquer trays in a process called “tea inspection” (chaken).
30. Chaken continues.
31. Tea leaves are sieved for a uniform aspect and dried again over a roaster (neri no ho-iro).
32. An old monk and four high-ranking officials wearing kamishimo kimonos inspect the tea a final time before it is returned to earthen jars that are then sealed.
33. The final scene shows a cup of matcha tea being consumed inside a tea-house in the presence of a tea-merchant.