Lot 152: Takuan Soho (1573-1645)

Letter to Itamiya Sofu
Signed Soho and dated Nigatsu nijusannichi (2.23)
Letter mounted as a hanging scroll; ink on paper
11 1/4 x 16 3/8in. (28.5 x 41.5cm.)

Property from the Collection of Alvin Abrams

As a student of art history at New York's Hunter College in the mid-1950s, Alvin Abrams became fascinated by Japanese calligraphy, especially as practiced by Zen masters. He appreciated the simplicity and directness of their drawings of fauna, flora and human eccentricities.

In the 1970s Abrams interested Yabumoto Soshiro, a prominent Tokyo art dealer, in a research project that resulted in the formation of a collection of works by Takuan, Bankei, Mokuan, Hakuin, Fugai, Sengai, Kazan and Ganku. Their collaboration was enriched by the research of Yamada Tadayoshi, a historian and former executive of Nippon Steel and officer of the World Trade Organization. Mr. Yamada provided expertise for swords and sword fittings (some of which are offered in the afternoon session of this sale) and translated much of the results of his enquiries into Japanese or English. It is the wish of Alvin Abrams that other collectors who come to acquire these paintings will continue the research and appreciation of these works sparked fifty years ago.

Itamiya Sofu (d. 1630) was a wealthy merchant in Sakai, the port adjacent to Osaka. He was famous as a man of tea, having studied tea ceremony with Kobori Enshu (1597-1647). Sofu was very close to Takuan; he wrote an inscription on a portrait of Takuan.

Takuan was a major figure in the Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism. He was the second son of one of the most important retainers of Lord Yamana of Tajima Province (Hyogo Prefecture) and began his study of Zen at a local temple in 1591. He then moved to Kyoto to train at Daitokuji Temple under Shun'oku Soen (1529-1611), who gave him the name Soho. In 1606, he became the 153rd abbot of Daitokuji, but he resigned after three days. He subsequently moved to Nanshuji Temple in Sakai, where he took the name Takuan. In 1632, after a period of exile in Dewa Province (Yamagata Prefecture) for opposition to government policy, he returned to Daitokuji. The third shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu, studied Zen with Takuan.