北斎と借景 BORROWING BACKGROUND VIEW & HOKUSAI

 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　北斎と借景

借景という言葉は京都の龍安寺の石庭を描写するときによく使われます。龍安寺は幅２２メートル奥行き１０メートルの土壁に囲まれた枯山水の庭で、箒目を付けた白砂と１５個の石があるだけです。

縁側から庭を眺めるとあたかも白砂が海で石が山のように見えます。庭の色調は土壁にマッチしています。視線を上げると、土壁の背景に沢山の高い木々が茂っています。

庭師は庭を造るとき背景の木の景色を計算に入れていたのです。この庭は背景の木の景色を「借用」しているのです。だから、龍安寺の庭は「借景」の庭だと言われるのです。

　

 馬鹿なロバ

狐に正体

見破られ（イソップ）

借景のひどい例が名古屋にあります。白鳥庭園です。広い庭園で、池が３つ、川、滝、茶室、レストランがあり木々が茂って花が咲いています。池のほとりを歩くと、まるで森の中を歩いているような気になります。

しかし、残念なことに、庭園のすぐ隣に２２階建てのマンションがそびえています。庭園から北方を眺めますと、否が応でもマンションが目に入ります。マンションは伝統的な日本庭園にはマッチしません。自然の懐に抱かれた気分を害します。だから私はレストランでお茶を飲むときは、いつも不快なマンションを背にして座ります。

マンションの
住人、庭が
お気に入り

 

 

しかし、素晴らしい借景もあります。日光東照宮の陽明門です。１９９９年に世界遺産に指定された３７５年前の建造物で、徳川家康を権現化しています。夜中に陽明門の正面に立って門を見ると門の真ん中の真上に北極星が見えます。陽明門は北極星を借景にしているのです。家康は江戸幕府を北極星のように不動の霊魂として守護したいと思ったのです。

着陸船
後ろに見ゆるは
青い地球

借景のもう一つの素晴らしい例は葛飾北斎が描いた屋台の天井画です。北斎は19世紀の画家でモネやルノワールに影響を与えています。

天井画は、一メートル四方の絵画で、海に渦巻く波を描いており、飛沫が一面に飛び散っています。絵を見ていると、荒波が砕ける音が聞こえ、目が眩むようです。感嘆するのは波の先端です。先端は子供の掌のようで、全ての指が曲がっており、見ていると海に引きこまれそうです。

先日ＮＨＫテレビで北斎の天井画が特集されました。解説者は、北斎は「波と海」を描いたのではなく、「波と空」を描いたと言っていました。実は北斎は海面の視点から夜空を描いたのです。海のように見えるのは空で、飛沫のように見えるのは星なのです。

北斎が天井画を頼まれた時、天井を空と見たてたのです。北斎は、天井画を見る人が空を見上げていると思うように考えたのです。天井を見て海を想像するのはちぐはぐだからです。北斎は天井を最大限に生かしたのです。

 

マイ借景
親と日本と
全宇宙

 
 

**************************************************************

　　　 　SHAKKEI (BORROWED SCENERY) & HOKUSAI

 

The word shakkei is often used when you describe the rock garden of the 550-year-old Ryoan-ji Temple in Kyoto. It is a 22-by-10 meter rectangle zen garden consisting only of raked gravel and 15 rocks surrounded by soil walls.

It is said that if you sit on the veranda of the temple and look at the garden, you feel as if the gravel were a sea of clouds and the rocks were mountains. The tone of the garden is well matched with the old brown wall. If you look up at the background scenery behind the wall, you will see a lot of tall trees.

The garden designer made the garden taking the background tree scenery into consideration so that it would add to the beauty of the garden. Metaphorically speaking, he “borrowed” the background view in making the garden. This is why the word shakkei (borrowed view) is used to describe Ryoan-ji Temple garden.

the donkey looks scary

covered by

a lion’s skin (Aesop)

There is a staggeringly bad example of shakkei garden in Nagoya. It is Shiratori Teien (White Bird Garden). It is a large garden with three ponds, a river, a waterfall, tea houses, a restaurant, and a lot of flowers and trees. When you walk beside the ponds, you feel as if you were walking in the woods.

What is disappointing, however, is a 22-story condominium which stands ominously just beside the garden. If you look north from the garden, you can’t help seeing it in the background. It does not fit in the traditional Japanese garden. The sight ruins the quiet and relaxed feeling you get from nature. Whenever I sip green tea in the restaurant, I sit with my back facing the monster.

residents of

the condominium

appreciate the garden

On the other hand, an astonishingly skillful example of shakkei is Yomeimon Gate of Nikko Tosho-gu Shrine, a World Heritage Site designated in 1999. It is a 375-year-old building which enshrines Ieyasu Tokugawa, the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate. If you stand in front of the gate and look at it at night, you will see the North Star shining just above the center of the gate. It utilizes the star as shakkei. Ieyasu wanted to protect the Edo Government as an immovable spirit like the North Star.

the Eagle on the moon

the blue earth

in the background

Another good example of shakkei is a ceiling painting of a festival float painted by Katsushika Hokusai, a 19^th century painter whose work influenced Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

  It is about a one-meter square painting of rough waves on a blue sea with foam scattered all over. It is alive and vibrant. You can almost hear the crash of the whirling waves, and even feel dizzy. The most striking part is the way the crest of the waves are drawn. They look like a child’s open hands with crooked fingers. They invite you, scrape you, and draw you into the sea.

   According to an NHK TV program featuring the picture, Hokusai did not paint “waves on the sea” but “waves under the sky.” He painted the night sky from sea level. What looks like the sea is the sky, and what looks like foam are stars. 

   When Hokusai was asked to draw a picture on the ceiling, he regarded it as the sky. People looking up at the ceiling painting would feel like they are looking at the sky from the sea. It is ambivalent if you look at the ceiling and imagine the sea. Hokusai made the most of the position of the ceiling.

My shakkei:

parents, country,

and the universe

突然エイリアン SUDDENLY AN ALIEN

　　突然エイリアン

小布施の駅を午後４時に

去って、名古屋へ３時間

さよなら小布施、北斎館

栗饅頭やコスモスよ

小布施の路地や大通り

一日歩いてくたびれて

喉を潤す缶ビール

電車に揺れて眠くなる

山並み際立つ午後の５時

まばゆく太陽沈みかけ

最後の光放ちつつ

茜雲が暗くなる

夕焼け空に星光り

黒い稜線シルエット

いよいよ空が暗くなり

空と山並み溶ける黒

灯りちらほら６時半

車窓に見える高いビル

ネオンや車きらびやか

突如見上げる名古屋駅

小布施の道や舞妓の絵

コスモスの花消え去りて

一瞬名古屋になじめずに

突然お前はエイリアン

**********************************************

　　　　　　　　　SUDDENLY AN ALIEN

　　In early October I visited Obuse in Nagano Prefecture with my wife. It took about three hours to get there by train. Obuse is famous for the Hokusai Art Museum, which exhibits the 19th century painter, Katsushika Hokusai's wood-block prints and his original paintings. One of them attracted my attention. It is a picture of a dancing girl clad in red priestess clothes holding a dancing bell.

　　There were a lot of cosmoses and chestnut trees by the roadsides. I enjoyed walkig along the Chestnut Path, which was paved with chestnut treee blocks. I enoyed eating chestnut jam bums.

Obuse Station at four in the afternoon

three-hour return trip to Nagoya

good-bye Obuse, roadside cosmoses,

chestnut trees, and Hokusai Art Museum

exhausted after walking all day

along the country roads in Obuse

a can of beer quenches my throat

asleep in the shaking of the train

at five, the mountain ridge against the sky

the sun is setting beaming the last light

of the day. Reddish clouds are fading and

the sky is changing into darkness

a star above the mountain silhouette

the sky is getting darker and darker

darkness of the sky and darkness of mountains

finally mingle, leaving no distinct border

at six thirty, a few lights from the passing houses

as the train approaches Nagoya, I see

tall buildings, neon signs, busy vehicles,

lastly Nagoya Station skyscrapers overwhelms me

what has become of cosmoses in Obuse?

chestnut trees, buns, and Hokusai’s dancing girl?

for a few moments I am an alien

breathing filthy air surrounded by foreigners