Araki Kanpō (荒木寛畝): Flower-and-Bird Painting of the Meiji Era
Araki Kanpō (荒木寛畝, 1831–1915) was one of the most important representatives of Kachō-ga, Japanese flower-and-bird painting, in the 19th century. He was born as Tanaka Yoshi; his childhood name was Kōzaburō. At the age of 22 he became the adopted son of his teacher Araki Kankai and took on his family name. Through Kankai, Kanpō stands in the lineage of Tani Bunchō – that painting tradition which had made the simultaneous study of several schools its program.
A Detour Through Western Painting
Kanpō's work is shaped by an experience unusual for Japanese painters of his generation: he engaged seriously, for a time, with Western painting. What he learned there about observation and physicality, he subsequently brought back into the traditional technique. The result is a flower-and-bird painting of dense, opaque coloring and exceptionally fine brushwork, in which plumage and petal gain a materiality foreign to the older Kachō-ga.
Late Recognition
The real breakthrough came late. In 1890 his peacock painting was awarded a second prize at the Third National Industrial Exhibition and entered imperial possession – Kanpō was, by that time, already in his late fifties. From 1893 he taught at girls' higher schools, from 1898 he taught as professor at the Tōkyō School of Fine Arts, and in 1900 he became imperial court artist. Among his students was Ikegami Shūho.
Camellia and Songbird: A Winter Picture
The camellia blooms when little else does, and thus belongs to the few flower motifs of the cold months. Its thick, glossy leaves and heavy blossom call for opaque color – precisely the field in which Kanpō's technique shows its strength. A songbird among the branches gives the scene its scale and its movement. Such hanging scrolls belong to the weeks between the turn of the year and the plum blossom, when the tokonoma is otherwise difficult to furnish.
