White-Robed Willow Kannon

A single sheet of silk was painted and inscribed by Shūitsu to appear as a normal hanging scroll, depicting White-Robed (Byaku-e) Kannon descending on a cloud bank. Moreover, the willow branch in his right hand, and the vase in his left also identify this deity as a manifestation of Willow (Yōryū) Kannon. The willow branch is believed to ward off evil and illness, while the vase contains a nectar with healing powers. The outer white cape, rendered with compulsive lacelike web of fine lines in gofun (shell pigment), suggests an otherworldly aura.

All the “pieces” of what at first glance appears to be a silk mounting, however, including the fūtai (vertical flaps at the top center of a Japanese hanging scroll) are painted using a convention called “painted mounting” (kakibyōsō). The large white lotus flower from a distance appears to be part of a fabric mounting, but it is a trompe-l’oeil painting of the variety that artists of the Edo Rinpa school of the early nineteenth century had made a specialty. The middle indigo “border” is a transcription in gold paint in Shūitsu’s own hand of the Kannon chapter of the Lotus Sutra. See a similar rendering of the sutra passage from the Kannon-kyō on a painting of White-Robed Kannon by Kiitsu’s Rinpa predecessor Sakai Hōitsu (1761–1829) in The Met’s collection (2017.293). All the details of the composition here are meticulously executed, especially impressive is the degree of detail: the nectar in the glass vase that Kannon holds in his left hand, for example, is painted in a very light application of shimmery, translucent mica; the cloud on which Kannon descends is painted using extremely light ink wash and several applications of light gold wash while taking advantage of the unmarked silk; the halo and other motifs painted in gold are slightly raised, suggesting that Shūitsu applied the gold on top of shell white.

Shūitsu, oldest son and artistic heir of Edo Rinpa painter Suzuki Kiitsu (1796–1858), demonstrates how he had mastered the techniques of both floral painting and iconographic paintings produced by his father, who had earlier apprenticed and then collaborated closely with Sakai Hōitsu, who had founded the Edo Rinpa school based on the models of eighteenth-century master Ogata Kōrin.

The work is stored in a paulownia wood box inscribed by the artist himself, referring to the work as White-Robed Willow Kanzeon (Byaku-e Yōryū Kanzeon zu 白衣楊柳觀世音図), using the more formal rendering of the bodhisattva’s name, Kanzeon (Chinese: Guanshiyin), which means “[The One Who] Perceives the Sounds of the World.”