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context: painting > great schools > tosa
Tosa Mitsunobu, 1434-1525
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Tale of the Crane by Tosa Mitsunobu
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The school appears to have been founded by Tsunetaka in the thirteenth century, but it was Mitsunobu's appointment in 1469 as head of the E-dokoro, the imperial artistic academy that cemented their place with the emperor and the imperial court. Tosa artists harkened back to the Heian glory days of the court, before the emperor was reduced to a figurehead, with the bright colours, golden clouds and 'exploded roof' viewing angles of, in particular, the great narrative scrolls, especially those of The Tale of Genji. Their themes and styles were explicitly Japanese for the most part, part of the yamato-e style that set itself against the overbearing influence of Chinese styles. It might be said that an anti-Chinese stance and allying themselves so tightly to the emperor were both poor choices, in that the Kano school probably did better over the next few centuries, but the Tosa school still did very well.