Representation of Pine Trees in “Landscape under the Sun and Moon”, Kongoji Collection

Abstract

This study is to investigate the influence of coloring materials on the screen composition and expression of pine needles in “Landscapes under the sun and moon”, which is a technique unique to the Four Seasons paintings of the Muromachi period. Tree expression in Japanese painting is rooted in Kan-ga and Yamato-e, and I argue that the characteristics of this piece are influential in the development of tree expression and also in the contemporary development of summer scenes, normally represented by flowers and grasses. As a result of a detailed analysis of expressions of pine needles in each season, I classify them into five types: (1) Suito-ten, (2) Shoyo-ten, (3) Gyoto-ten, (4) One-tone flat expression using a thick brush, and (5) Two-tone flat overlapping expression using a thick brush. In addition to these five types, from the viewpoint of depiction technique, the layers of paint were classified into three. With these results, I discuss summer scenes and trees representing the seasons and the corresponding changes in pine needles and I find that the piece exhibits diverse expressive effects on the screen.