Pure Sound of the Rivers and Mountains

Takebe Ryo_tai was a contemporary of Japan's most famous nanga artists, Ike Taiga and Yosa Buson, but there is no evidence that Ryo_tai knew either of them. Ryo_tai's interest in Chinese-style painting began when he was a Zen monk at To_fukuji temple in Kyoto. He eventually abandoned monastic life to devote himself to painting and poetry, and sought out noted masters such as Sakaki Hyakusen (Taiga's teacher) and Kumashiro Yuhi, a Nagasaki painter of birds and flowers. Ryo_tai's use of wet, freely applied brushstrokes in this painting, however, reflects the influence of Fei Han-yuan, a Chinese artist who visited Nagasaki and under whom Ryo_tai studied in 1754.