Page 154 - Edo: Art in Japan, 1615–1868

Images of peasants and workers

Workers of in the Edo period could be humorous, didactic, sympathetic, idealized, or

Edo: Ambiance, derisive. The thorough, sometimes encyclopedic, depictions of work by

Archetype, artists of the period sprang from the long history of this theme in Japanese

or Individual art and were fostered by clearer definitions of the place of the worker 153

in society

H O L L I S G O O D A L L The theme of artisans and farmers first drew the attention of the

art patron class, the nobility, during the Heian period (794-1185). Farmers

began to use the off-season to produce linens, lacquer, indigo, or other

1
luxury goods desired by the aristocrats. The laboring farmer or fisherman

appeared as narrative details in paintings of famous places (meishoe),

in images of the seasons (shifeie), and in depictions of monthly ceremonies

(tsukinamie] — the three central themes of paintings found in Heian

aristocratic residences. Like waka poets, the artists of the period strove

to capture a sympathetic alliance between people and their natural sur-

roundings. The anecdotal detail of laborers at work suggests the nature

of daily life at the time, but these painted screens were primarily meant

to evoke a particular time of year (fig. i). 2

Farmers shown in a Shinto mándala work near a shrine dedicated

to the god of rice, thereby serving as didactic examples of the efficacy

of prayer. Townspeople, merchants, and beggars appear in narrative hand-

scrolls, most notably the Pictorial Biography of the Monk Ippen of 1299,

enhancing the realism of the narrative and serving as an audience for

Opposite: detail of Rice Cultivation in the Four Seasons (cat. 91)