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Fujimoto Tesseki (1817-1863)
Nanga
Landscape
Signed: Tekkanshi Makane
Seals: Gen Makane noin, Kichibi danshi & Kazekasugatsukasu (bottom)
Technique: sumi on paper 129,6 x 30,2
Date: 6th month of 1860
Mounting: green decorated damask 183 x 41
Box: inscribed by Hakutô (dates unknown)
Condition: very good

The importance of Tesseki as a painter has been overshadowed by his political career and his romantic death as a martyr.

Tesseki was born into a samurai family from Okayama. From childhood he studied literature, poetry and calligraphy, Chinese as well as Japanese and the Chinese Sung style of painting, but also military tactics and martial arts. Around the age of 25 he went to Osaka and later to Kyoto. His military education, which he received in Kyoto, resulted in the rank of master swordsman.
Like many young intellectuals at that time, he went on a journey and studied at the Kangien, a school for (Neo-)Confucian studies. He returned to Kyoto in 1851. After Ii Naosuke (1815-1860), the head councillor of the shogunate had signed the treaty with the foreigners, and the imperial princess Kazu (1846-1877) had married the 14th shogun Tokugawa Iemochi (1846-1866) in a political alliance in 1862, Tesseki became a violent imperialist. He joined several raids and was killed in 1863 at Nara in a fight against the soldiers of the Kishu Clan.

Reference:
Berry & Morioka ’08 p. 254-56 (# 65, 76)
Kato ’98 (chapter 1) # 128-137
Addiss '83 pp. 198-199
Roberts p. 177
Araki p. 2749

Price: ON REQUEST