A scholar with staff accompanied by a servant pauses while crossing a river bridge to enjoy the view of green willows and blossoming peach trees. The soft pastel colors of the natural scenery are continued and extended by the colored stones of the bridge over which a wooden walkway is laid. This lovely area of narrative interest is separated from the imposing peaks in the distant by a band of tinted clouds and mist that appears warmed by the scene below and on the other hand to reflect light on to the cliffs above. Much of the style here was derived from Chinese literati painting but the overt and charming appeal to the senses seems purely Japanese.
The artist Shimizu Kan, azana Shitetsu, go Tenmin, was born in Omi, the modern Shiga prefecture. Learning to paint under Ichikawa Kunkei and later Kishi Ganku (1749-1838), Tenmin became of fame equal to that of Kawamura Bumpo (1779-1821), another pupil of Ganku in Kyoto. Tenmin later moved to Edo and became well known for his figure and flower-and-bird paintings, unfortunately passing away while still fairly young, perhaps about the same time as Bumpo. In Edo at that time there were three artists who used the name Tenmin, hence they became known as the “Three Tenmin”: Shimizu Tenmin, our artist, Namikawa Tenmin, a calligrapher, and Okubo Shibutsu, a Nanga painter and the poet who contributed a verse to the present painting. Given the close association of Tenmin with Okubo Shibutsu, the present painting was most likely created in 1801, shortly before it was inscribed by Shibutsu.
As might be expected of an artist who studied with Ganku, Tenmin became especially adept at painting birds, in his case the crane, which the Itsujin Gahsi said appeared rather thin in Tenmin’s paintings. One published example (figure 1) is an impressive study in verisimilitude, with the bird portrayed in great naturalistic detail engaged in a most characteristic activity, preening its feathers. It is understandable that such a painting captured the interest of Erwin von Baelz (b. 1849), a German medical doctor who in 1876 was officially requested by the Meiji government to teach internal medicine in the Tokyo Medical School, now part of Tokyo National University. During his stay in Japan, Baelz became very interested in Japanese art and collected some 6,000 paintings dating to the Edo and Meiji periods and encompassing virtually the full range of styles and schools. These works are now among the treasures of the Linden Museum in Stuttgart.
Fig. 1. Shimizu Tenmin: “Crane,” after Baelz Collection—Kaettekita Bakumatsu Meiji no Kaiga, Doitsu Linden Hakubutsu Kan Shozo, Tokyo, 1993, pl. 30.
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