Mountains and trees in the “Album of Taiga’s Drawings” from the collection of the Sakhalin Art Museum

Abstract

This article analyses the development of the early landscape style of Japanese painter and calligrapher Ike Taiga (1723–1776), with a focus on his “Album of Taiga’s Drawings” (Taiga gafu) and three specific works from the collection of the Sakhalin Art Museum. As a pioneer of the Bunjinga (‘literati painting’) and Shinkeizu (‘true view’ or topographical painting) genres, Taiga synthesized Japanese, Chinese, and Korean traditions while incorporating elements of European fine art to create a highly original landscape style. The transformation of 18th-century Japanese landscape painting was driven by expanding cultural contacts, specifically the circulation of Chinese woodblock-printed albums and the introduction of European aesthetics through Dutch engravings. The study aims to identify the key factors that shaped Taiga’s early landscape style and to introduce works from the Sakhalin Art Museum into scientific circulation. The analysis focuses on pieces from the first volume of the “Album of Taiga’s Drawings”, which was published posthumously in 1803 by his pupil Geppo Shinryo. This edition was only the second comprehensive painting manual by a Japanese author, following Hayashi Moriatsu’s six-volume “Gasen” of 1721. The emergence of such albums marked a departure from the exclusive imitation of Chinese models and foreshadowed Katsushika Hokusai’s celebrated “Mangas” (1814–1819 and 1834–1878). However, to date, this album has not been the subject of a dedicated art-historical study. This research employs a multifaceted art-historical methodology. A compositional analysis was used to examine the structure of the artist’s album leaves, while a cultural-historical approach allowed for the identification of characteristic features of Taiga’s early landscapes within the broader evolution of Japanese painting and the formation of the Bunjinga genre. Furthermore, a stylistic and formal analysis was used to determine the primary expressive means of the works. The study identifies several formative landscape elements, specifically the rendering of trees and mountains, and highlights the influence of Far Eastern traditions and Western European art on Taiga’s artistic style. Through this analysis, the origins of the artist’s manner, which reached its full maturity in the landscapes of the 1760s and 1770s, are revealed.