Misty Moon

This painting creates its forms through the spread of blurred pigments, rather than through traditional Japanese painting methods which give great importance to lines drawn in black ink. This painting style was condemned as Morotai, of "dimly formed," and "ghostly" when it was first exhibited, because of the missing black lines. And yet, by abandoning ink lines this painting provides a splendid image of a moonlit scene blurred by the spring mists< its entire composition filled with a fresh, moist atmosphere. Taikan's development of this painting style was partly stimulated by the plein-air expressive methods of the Hakubakai and other new trends in Japan's western-style painting world. At the same time, Taikan was largely influenced by the philosophy of Okakura Tenshin, the director of the Nihon Bijutsuin, who believed that flowing, moving things embody the essence of the Asian spirit. Here the moist air fills the composition and its quivering sense of movement can be seen as traces of modern Nihonga's artistic quest, vacillating between westernization and the maintenance of an Asian identity.