Lot 295: MORI KANSAI (1814-1894) Edo period (1615-1868), 1859 Pair of tall kakej

MORI KANSAI (1814-1894) Edo period (1615-1868), 1859 Pair of tall kakejiku (hanging scrolls); ink on and colours on silk in silk mounts, depicting on the right-hand scroll a cat crossing a bridge beneath a pine tree and on the lefthand scroll another cat on the roof of a thatched farmhouse beneath the full moon, the left-hand scroll signed Tsuchinoto-hitsuji no haru sha Kansai (Drawn by Kansai in spring 1859) and sealed Tachibana Koshuku in and Tachibanashi Shiyo, the right-hand scroll sealed Tachibana Koshuku in; with a wooden storage box. Each overall: 187cm x 23.5cm (73 5/8in x 9¼in); image: 104cm x 11cm (41in x 4 3/8in). (3).

Born at Hagi in Nagato Province, Mori Kansai moved to Osaka in 1831 to study with Mori Tetsuzan, who later him sent him to Kyoto where he painted in the Maruyama-Shijo style. A staunch adherent of the imperial loyalist faction, he found himself in political difficulties in the 1860s but after the Meiji Restoration opened a successful private art academy and continued to paint in a wide range of styles. His works are often dated. The two seals on this pair, one white on red and the other red on white, were also used on a 1883 painting of Murasaki Shikibu at the Ishiyamadera Temple, see The Museum of Modern Art, Shiga, Omi hakkei: Kokoku fukeiga no seiritsu to tenkai (The Eight Views of Lake Biwa: Origins and Development of Landscape Painting in our Country of Lakes), exhibition catalogue, 1988, pp.100,144.