収蔵品データベース

僧房春蘭(牡丹の寺)そうぼうしゅんらん(ぼたんのてら)

昭和4年(1929)

絹本着色・軸

57.6 × 70.6cm

郷土会第14回展

「僧房春蘭」は旧題、箱書きには「牡丹の寺」と記されています。遠景に花頭窓を配す僧房の中庭を、咲き誇る牡丹の花が取り囲んでいます。画面中央に松と紅枝垂れを配する大胆な構図ですが、画面に破綻はなく、樹木の垂直性と相まって、空へとつづく空間の広がりや中庭の奥行きを実に自然に感じさせる作品です。郷土会は大正4年(1915)に清方門下により結成され、大正15年(1926)に門下の自治制となりました。新たに第二部を発足した昭和3年(1928)には、江東美術展覧会を開催し、日雇い労働者等を労うために郷土会の作品も展示しました。清方は、咲き誇る牡丹に、弟子たちの活躍する姿を重ねていたのかもしれません。この年、金鈴社で一緒だった盟友の吉川霊華が没しています。


Sōbō Shunran (Peony Temple) (1929)
color on silk; hanging scroll
57.6 x 70.6 cm
(First exhibited at the 14th Kyōdokai exhibition)

The note of authentication for this work says Botan no Tera (Peony Temple), but its former title was Sōbō Shunran (Buddhist monk’s house in spring). Peonies in full bloom surround the courtyard of the temple quarters with its curvilinear katōmado window in the background. The composition is bold, with a pine tree and a weeping cherry tree placed at the center, but with the vertical orientation of the trees and shrubs, unbroken across the picture plane, coupled with the depth of the courtyard and an expanse of space that leads the eye to the sky, the work feels natural. In 1926, the Kyōdokai, which had been organized by students of Kiyokata in 1915, switched to a system of self-government by members. When Kyōdokai Part II was launched in 1929, works by the members were shown at the Kōtō Art Exhibition organized to encourage laborers. Perhaps Kiyokata superimposed, in his imagination, the busy figures of his students on the flowering peonies. The year 1929 is also when Kikkawa Reika, Kiyokata’s close friend at the Kinreisha, died.