Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (月岡芳年) (artist 04/30/1839 – 06/09/1892)

Rochishin and the Guardian God [Statue] - Rochishin ransui Godaisen Kongōjin o uchikowasu no zu (魯智深爛酔打壊五壹山金剛神之図)

Print

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Date:1887
Dimensions:9.6 in x 28.5 in (Overall dimensions) Medium:Japanese color woodblock print
Inscription:Signature: Yoshitoshi (芳年)
Artist's seal: Yoshitoshi no in
Carver: Negishi Chokuzan
Links Waseda University (bottom sheet)
Waseda University (top sheet)
Tokyo National Museum
Hagi Uragami Museum of Art - top panel
Hagi Uragami Museum of Art - bottom panel
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Rijksmuseum
National Diet Library
Art Institute of Chicago
Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art
Fitzwilliam Museum
Musées Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire (via Ritsumeikan University) - bottom panel only
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Minneapolis Institute of Art
Yokohama Museum of Art
Marega Collection, Università Pontificia Salesiana (via Ritsumeikan University) - top half
Marega Collection, Università Pontificia Salesiana (via Ritsumeikan University) - bottom half Description:Among my all-time favorite characters, Lu Ta ( Lu Chi Shen - Japanese: Rochishin), is depicted here as he demolishes the gate of the temple of the Five-Crested Mountain (Godaizan) in the novel Outlaws of the Marsh (Suikoden). A Chinese captain, he provoked a butcher who had been harassing the young daughter of an acquaintance and, when the butcher attacked with his knife, Lu slapped him and the butcher died, a capital offense. In order to escape the death penalty, he agreed to became a priest at the prestigious temple. The abbot cut his hair and renamed him Lu Chi Shen, “Lu of Deep Wisdom.” Lu soon tired of his chaste lifestyle and, disregarding his priestly vows, he left the monastery, beat up a wine merchant, drank a huge bucket of wine on the spot and drank a second as he staggered back up the mountain to the monastery. Seeing his drunken state, the monks barred the gate and refused him entrance. In his rage, Lu destroys the wooden temple guardian, shatters the temple gate, fights his way through all the other monks and pass out in the mediation hall, fouling it horribly from both ends before he awakens badly hung over. The abbot is forced to dismiss him and sends him to a lesser temple where he continues to drink and fight colorfully throughout the novel, eventually joining the 108 outlaw heroes of the Suikoden in their struggles against government corruption. It is only at the very moment of his death (during yet another dramatic fight) that Lu achieves deep understanding in a flash and ascends to heaven. [Quote from the owner, Mike Lyon.]

First edition published by Matsui Eikichi in 1887 had blind printing, burnishing, and the use of a pigment in the guardian figure which oxidized in a lovely way. There were several intermediate printings before Hasegawa Tsunejirō [5 banchi Kaji-chō, Kanda-ku, Tokyo] reprinted the design (with a seal in the upper left margin "Reproduction not permitted" and lacking date. Also, the Hasegawa printings replaced the guardian pigment with one which didn't oxidize. Although the left margin has been trimmed in this example, the guardian figure is heavily oxidized, there's mica on the top sheet, a fantastic cheese-cloth pattern embossed by shomen-zuri (front side printing) on Lu's black robe, blind embossing in title cartouche, so I'm supposing this is a Matsui published first or early edition.

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Scholten Japanese Art wrote:

Rochishin (Lu Chi Shen in Chinese) is an anti-hero from the Suikoden (Tales of the Water Margin), a 16th century collection of stories considered to be one of the classics of Chinese literature. Rochishin, the tattooed subject of the lower sheet, is an outlaw. He was once a police officer named Rotatsu. In that capacity he killed a butcher who had abused his (the butcher's) mistress. The mistress' father advised Rotatsu to take the monk's name Rochishin and retire to the monastery on Mount Godai. Once on the mountain, he became widely feared for robbing merchants and drinking heavily, the latter of which activities was often followed by vomiting and urinating in the temple. After taking time to gather their courage, the monks forced him out of the monastery, at which point Rochishin joined a gang of thieves.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the life of a robber suited him well. He soon returned to the Mount Godai monastery when a rival gang found refuge within the temple walls. In this composition, Yoshitoshi depicts him by the monastery's entrance fiercely dismantling its sacred Nio (Buddhist guardian statue, also called Kongo). The drunken outlaw, whose determination is evident by his gritted face and athletic posture, holds firm beneath a heavy beam and falling green posts. The teetering Nio threatens him from above.

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The Flower Priest

Rochishin was often referred to as the Flower (or Floral) Priest. The best manifestation of this is the beautiful tattoo of cherry blossoms on his upper torso and arms. Originally, in some earlier prints, it was often prunus blossoms, the first harbinger of spring. Later for various reasons it was changed to cherry blossoms.

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There is another copy of this composition in the Worcester Museum of Arts.

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Illustrated:

1) In color in The World of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Tsukioka Yoshitoshi no Sekai - 月岡芳年の世界) by Susugu Yoshida, pp. 28-29, #13. This includes a full-page, colored detail of Rochishin.

2) In black and white reproduction in Yoshitoshi: The Splendid Decadent by Shinichi Segi, Kodansha International Ltd., 1985, page 72, no. 89.

3) In color in Yoshitoshi: Masterpieces from the Ed Fries Collection, by Chris Uhlenbeck, Amy Reigle Newland, et al., Hotei Publishing, 2011, no. 90, p. 124.

4) In a black and white reproduction in Catalogue of the Collection of Japanese Prints Part V - The Age of Yoshitoshi, Rijksprentkabinet/Rijksmuseum, 1990, no. 37, p. 35.

5) in The Bizarre Imagery of Yoshitoshi: The Herbert R. Cole Collection by Roger Keyes, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1980, #37.

6) in a black and white in Japanese Prints: Realities of the "Floating World" by Marjorie L. Williams, Published by The Cleveland Museum of Art with Indiana University Press, 1983, #30, page 44.
Related entities Matsui Eikichi (松井栄吉) (publisher)
warrior prints (musha-e - 武者絵) (genre)
Kakemono-e - 掛物絵 (genre)
Suikoden (水滸傳) (genre)

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