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Lot Essay
The verse reads:
Yono naka ni mi no nari idete omohu koto
Nasu ha medetaki tameshi nari keri
Ota Rengetsu, a Buddhist nun from Kyoto, is known as one of the great poets of the 19th century, as well as a calligrapher, painter and potter. In 1855, she became a mentor to the young Tomioka Tessai, a literati painter, and it is known that she had significant impact on Tessai for the rest of his life. When she was offered calligraphy commissions as an accomplished poet, Rengetsu sometimes let Tessai paint the accompanying images to try to help establish his career. This work represents such a collaboration as well as Rengetsu’s warm-hearted encouragement to Tessai. It is said that Tessai admired and respected Rengetsu to such an extent that he kept her works including those they collaborated upon, until his death. According to the inscription on the box label, this work could have been one of such works kept in the Tomioka family.
For a similar example by Rengetsu in the collection of Jinko-in temple, see Sho to bokuga no graph shi, vol.44, September 1983, p.31. For another work by Rengetsu with aubergines, see Okadane Taro, Tessai geijutsu no michibikite Rengetsu [Rengetsu who guided Tessai’s art], in Sho to bokuga no graph shi, vol.44, September 1983, p. 58.
Yono naka ni mi no nari idete omohu koto
Nasu ha medetaki tameshi nari keri
Ota Rengetsu, a Buddhist nun from Kyoto, is known as one of the great poets of the 19th century, as well as a calligrapher, painter and potter. In 1855, she became a mentor to the young Tomioka Tessai, a literati painter, and it is known that she had significant impact on Tessai for the rest of his life. When she was offered calligraphy commissions as an accomplished poet, Rengetsu sometimes let Tessai paint the accompanying images to try to help establish his career. This work represents such a collaboration as well as Rengetsu’s warm-hearted encouragement to Tessai. It is said that Tessai admired and respected Rengetsu to such an extent that he kept her works including those they collaborated upon, until his death. According to the inscription on the box label, this work could have been one of such works kept in the Tomioka family.
For a similar example by Rengetsu in the collection of Jinko-in temple, see Sho to bokuga no graph shi, vol.44, September 1983, p.31. For another work by Rengetsu with aubergines, see Okadane Taro, Tessai geijutsu no michibikite Rengetsu [Rengetsu who guided Tessai’s art], in Sho to bokuga no graph shi, vol.44, September 1983, p. 58.