Nagasawa Rosetsu

Nagasawa Rosetsu (長沢 芦雪) né en 1754 et décédé le 10 juillet 1799, est un peintre japonais du XVIIIe siècle. On connaît surtout ses peintures de tigres et de singes très expressifs.





Il a aussi laissé des paysages dépouillés en mode zen.



mais pas que (et moi j'adore ça)



Enfin bref ! On n'est pas là pour parler de moi.
Il y a une expo à Zurich, si vous êtes dans le coin.

La légende raconte que, en 1786, en l’espace d’une seule nuit, l’artiste japonais Nagasawa Rosetsu (1754–1799) aurait peint sur les parois de la pièce principale d’un temple zen un tigre gigantesque et un dragon – symboles des forces primitives de l’existence humaine et de la Nature. Ces icônes de la peinture japonaise quittent pour la première fois leur pays d’origine et pourront être admirées en exclusivité, pendant huit semaines, au Musée Rietberg à Zurich.

L’exposition au Musée Rietberg comprend près de 60 travaux issus de multiples temples et de musées renommés au Japon, en Allemagne et aux États-Unis. Un grand nombre des pièces exposées sont enregistrées en tant que «biens culturels importants» [patrimoine culturel du Japon] ou «œuvres majeures» [trésors nationaux du Japon]. Au cœur de cet événement, on retrouve les 48 panneaux peints – dont le tigre et le dragon – ainsi que des rouleaux suspendus que Rosetsu a réalisé en 1786 pour la résidence de l’abbé de Muryōji, un temple Zen de Kushimoto (préfecture de Wakayama). Ils n’ont, jusqu'à présent, jamais été vus ailleurs dans leur intégralité. À Zurich, ils seront mis en scène dans une reconstruction du temple et offriront au public une expérience unique ainsi que la possibilité de profiter de la peinture dans son contexte architectural d’origine. L

La sélection des œuvres proposées offre une vue d’ensemble sur ses motifs préférés et sur le large éventail de son répertoire stylistique et formel. Les tableaux, quelques-fois extraordinairement réalistes, d’autres fois étonnamment modernes et presque abstraits, mettent en lumière sa biographie entourée de légendes et son lien avec le bouddhisme zen. Ses images nous emmènent dans un voyage sur les traces de Rosetsu à travers un Japon pré-moderne, jusqu’ici peu connu, et qui reste étonnamment proche de notre époque.



Pratique
«Rosetsu», Museum Rietberg, 15, Gablerstrase, Zurich jusqu'au 4 novembre. Tél. 044 415 31 31, site www.rietberg.ch Ouvert du mardi au dimanche de 10h à 17h, les mercredis et jeudis jusqu'à 20h.
http://www.rietberg.ch/fr-ch/home.aspx

Me ferait bien un petit voyage en Suisse, moi...

Quelques explications et images supplémentaires :

• For eight weeks, Japan’s most famous tiger is on show in Zurich. The legend states that Nagasawa Rosetsu (1754–1799) painted this monumental tiger in a single night in the year 1786, together with its counterpart, a dragon, on the sliding door panels (fusuma) of the Zen temple Muryo ji in Wakayama prefecture, Kansai region on Honshu. Now the entire temple’s painted walls and a number of other works by Rosetsu are on show – for the first time outside Japan.
  
  Renowned as one of the most eccentric and imaginative artists in early modern Japan, Nagasawa Rosetsu produced visually exciting, classification-defying works during his brief career. His highly dynamic and individualistic paintings were created with vigorous brushstrokes and sometimes even with his fingers in a method called shitoga (using fingers and hands rather than brushes). However, Rosetsu also created more delicate compositions that were painted with fine brushes in a rich colour palette that are replete with energy, wit, which still retain huge appeal for a modern audience.
  
  Rosetsu, who came from a low-ranking samurai family, gained his reputation among art circles in the imperial capital Kyoto and its neighbouring regions with his untamed personality and his unusual talent. He is often seen as the least well-known of the three Edo period (1603-1868) eccentric painters (kijin), the others being Soga Shohaku and Ito Jakuchu. Perhaps this is because his achievements have failed to eclipse the popularity of the most important works of his teacher, Maruyama Okyo (1733-1795). However, as a student, he was to become known as one of the best disciples of Okyo. Rosetsu mastered the superlative realism of his teacher that combined the indefinite spatial articulations of traditional Japanese painting and went on to develop his own unique style. Okyo’s new school of painting was in direct contrast to the established schools of the time: the Kano, Rimpa, and Tosa styles that originated in the Muromachi, Momoyama and early Edo periods. The new painting styles that developed can be loosely classified into two categories: the individualist or eccentric style and the bunjin-ga, literati painting style. These individualist painters were influenced by non-traditional sources such as Western painting perspectives and scientific studies of nature and who frequently portrayed unexpected themes, or techniques, to create unique works reflecting their own unconventional personalities.
  
  The Maruyama school believed in and taught direct observation of nature and encouraged a sense of realism in painting. A fusion of Western naturalism and the Eastern decorative style of the Kano School. The first master, Maruyama Okyo, who also founded the school, was dedicated to these principles and created pictures sketched from life rather than copying past masterpieces (which the Kano School encouraged – it was the ‘establishment’ school and considered the most famous and influential school of Japanese painting). The Maruyama artists’ works were filled with what they saw around them – birds, fish, monkeys, flowers, and plants in every stage of growth and season; they also paid attention to the weather, be it the moodiness of rain, or the atmosphere of a cloudless moonlight night. However, Rosetsu, took a strikingly different path to subject matter than the other pupils of Okyo and turned away from his master’s more disciplined and studied approach to composition and started to develop his own individual, freer style.
  
  It seems by 1781 whilst continuing to work under the auspices of Okyo’s school, he established his own studio and managed to cultivate his own benefactors, whilst continuing to work under Okyo.
  
  From 1786, when Rosetsu left Kyoto to produce screen paintings for Buddhist temples, this spontaneity and freer expression can be seen in his works, in direct contrast to Okyo’s careful pseudo-realism. By the time he returned to Kyoto, the elements of an eccentric style had become well established in his own painting style.
  
  At this point in his career, most of his important commissions came from Zen temples. Gregg Baker, the London dealer, comments on this period in Rosetsu’s life: On Okyo’s recommendation Rosetsu left for southern Kii Province (now Wakayama Prefecture) in 1786 and stayed for a year at the Muryo-ji, Sodo-ji and Joju-ji temples of the Zen Buddhist sect. Rosetsu created over 140 wall and screen paintings during this short period of time, most of which have been designated Important Cultural Properties. He was in his mid-thirties when he executed these works yet they survive in these temples to this day, they are, without exception, very ambitious paintings. Rosetsu was an extraordinarily versatile artist, at times close to the suiboku (literally water and ink) style of the Muromachi school of painting, and at others borrowing themes from ukiyo-e masters and painting famous Bijin (beauties). He often combined the bold composition of the Rimpa School with the humour of Zenga, frequently using a flat brush, or holding the brush in a slanting position, using different tones of ink in the same broad stroke. Occasionally the artist worked in a sort of Western technique called doro-e, a thick paint mixed with Chinese white, byobu (screens) commonly appear in pairs, each screen consisting of two or more, folding screens.
  
  The exhibition has a diverse range of Rosetsu’s works from scrolls depicting birds and flowers in brilliant polychrome pigments to large-scale sliding doors (fusuma) made for temples, as well as byobu, with works depicting fantastic landscapes, bizarre figures, and whimsical animals. With his unconventional compositions and powerful brushwork Rosetsu always offers a fresh take on traditional subject matter. The works were chosen in consultation with the Agency for Cultural Affairs of the Government of Japan (Bunkacho) to expressly reveal the breadth of his subject matter, his relationship to Zen Buddhism, contacts with patrons outside Kyoto, and his choice of portraying extraordinarily bold images.
  
  On show are a selection of 60 of his most important paintings, beginning with the earliest works in the realist style of his teacher Maruyama Okyo (1733-1795), and ending with the haunting and occasionally bizarre final masterpieces of his career. Screen paintings, scrolls, and albums depicting Zen eccentrics, children at play, beauties, landscapes, and as well as animals and birds take visitors on a journey through Rosetsu’s own travels and into his fantastic imagination that produced works that are compellingly realistic and sometimes surprisingly abstract. The Rietberg exhibition looks at  these many mysteries created by Rosetsu during his enigmatic career – and his untimely death in Osaka under suspicious circumstances.
  
  The highlight of the exhibition is the collection of 48 screens and hanging scrolls from Muryo-ji temple in Kushimoto. They are displayed using a floorplan that recreates the original layout of the ancient Zen temple in the southern part of Japan’s main island that holds the largest and most important collection of Rosetsu’s paintings, which were mainly created in 1786. The installation of these works, presented as they would have originally been seen, gives  an unprecedented opportunity to view and examine the paintings in a single venue outside their home in Kushimoto and it is the first such installation of architecturally specific paintings of this type in an exhibition outside Japan.
  
  Approximately one-third of the works are registered as Important Cultural Properties or Important Art Objects. Complementing these masterpieces from Japan are paintings from other museums, temples, and private collections in Japan, Europe, and the United States that help trace the phases of Rosetsu’s life as he pursued his livelihood in Kyoto and the surrounding provinces.
  
  The exhibition closes with a dramatic display of abstract landscapes, ghosts, and perhaps his most astonishing work of all – a depiction of 500 Disciples of the Buddha on a surface of only one square inch. An astonishing painting for an astonishing life.
  

Shoki the Demon Queller and Toad (1787) by Nagasawa Rosetsu, pair of hanging scrolls, ink on paper. Private collection, Japan


Chicken and Roses (1786) by Nagasawa Rosetsu, detail from a set of eight sliding panels, ink and light color on paper, Muryōji, Kushimoto.
Important Cultural Property


Tiger and Sparrows by Nagasawa Rosetsu, circa 1792-1794, detail from a set of eight sliding panels, ink and light colour on paper,
Yakushiji, Nara. Nara City Designated


Monkey on a Rock, by Nagasawa Rosetsu, circa 1792-1794, detail from a framed panel, ink and colour on gold ground.
Private Collection, Japan
http://asianartnewspaper.com/

C'est très joli, merci pour les photos.