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such as Duan Fang (端方), and had the opportunity to see their paintings in person. He realized that
the Chinese paintings that had been previously introduced into Japan from China were diferent from
those he saw in Beijing. While paintings of the Southern Song Painting Academy and the Zhe School
had been treasured as decoration for the tea ceremony and shoin-style rooms since the Muromachi
period in Japan, the focus in China was on the development of painting from the Northern Song (北宋
画院) to the Wu School (呉派) and to the Six Masters of the Qing period (四王呉惲), as based on Dong
Qichang’s art theory, which was regarded as orthodox in China. Under the guidance of Naito, Ueno
was motivated to form his own collection based on Naito’s new perspective of Chinese painting. Naito
also advised Ueno that calligraphy of the Jin and Tang periods, represented by Wang Xizhi (王義之
303-361), should be emphasized overall. The Song dynasty ink rubbing of Wang Xizhi’s “Preface to
the Sacred Teachings” (集王聖教序), acquired from Naito, who originally bought it from Luo Zhenyu (
羅振玉), became the frst calligraphy in Ueno’s collection. (Fig. 3)

Unfortunately, Ueno Riichi passed away in 1919 and his project to form a comprehensive collection
of Chinese paintings from Northern Song to early Qing was not completed. However, the Ueno
Collection signifcantly infuenced Chinese painting and calligraphy collections in Japan. Ueno’s
collection had been formed with the collaborative efort of Ueno, a collector, and Naito, an academic
scholar. Both of them had the appreciation necessary to understand authentic Chinese painting
without being swayed by the traditional connoisseurship of Chinese painting that had long been
valued in Japan. They tried to collect and introduce paintings based on the idea that a more authentic
understanding of Chinese paintings should be encouraged in Japan. Through their infuence, the
orthodox genealogy of Chinese paintings advocated by Dong Qichang became widely known in Japan.

JUHACHI-KAI, LITERALLY TRANSLATED AS

“EIGHTEEN PARTY”, WAS A GATHERING OF EIGHTEEN

IMPORTANT COLLECTORS IN KANSAI WHERE EACH

MEMBER EXHIBITED HIS COLLECTION BY TURNS,

COINCIDING WITH THE TEA CEREMONY. FUJITA

DENZABURO WAS A LEADING MEMBER OF THIS

PRESTIGIOUS SOCIETY.

As stated above, Sumitomo and Ueno formed collections of Chinese art totally unknown to
contemporary Japanese people. They were the forerunners of many prestigious Chinese art collectors
in the following periods in Kansai, as exemplifed by Abe Fusajiro’s (安部房次郎) Chinese painting
and calligraphy collection and Yamaguchi Kenshiro’s (山口謙四郎) Chinese stone Buddhist sculpture
collection, both of them now stored in the Osaka City Museum of Fine Arts (大阪市立美術館); the
Kano Jihei collection (嘉納治兵衛) in the Hakutsuru Museum (白鶴美術館); the Fujii Zensuke collection
(藤井善助) in the Fujii Yurinkan Museum (藤井有鄰館); and the Kurokawa Koshichi collection (黒川幸
七) in the Kurokawa Institute of Ancient Culture (黒川古文化研究所), all internationally known for the
quality of their Chinese art collections. The Fujita collection was also formed in the same period and
collector’s circle.

It is interesting that in the environment of the Meiji period, where the sencha tea ceremony dominated
the taste of collectors, the Fujita collection took a more conservative position by focusing on
traditional matcha tea ceremony utensils. Even with the conservative nature of the Fujita collection, it
refects a new approach to Chinese art, and the high quality of the pieces being ofered in the present
auction are proof of the vigorous connoisseurship of Kansai collectors.

Sencha, which was one of the motivations behind a phase of Chinese art collecting during the Meiji
period, became obsolete in the Taisho period (1912-1926) and was followed by a matcha tea revival.
However, the new appreciation of Chinese art nurtured in the sencha tea room continued to be
infuential and informed several unique Chinese art collections, as noted above. They developed into
collections of art for its own sake, that had been separated from the sencha and matcha aesthetic

26 IMPORTANT CHINESE ART FROM THE FUJITA MUSEUM