UNIDENTIFIED ARTIST, KANO SCHOOL

UNIDENTIFIED ARTIST, KANO SCHOOL
HOOPOE AND PRUNUS
PROBABLY EDO (1615-1868)

76cm x 32cm.

From a Japanese private collection, London.

A Japanese kakejiku (hanging scroll painting), depicting a crested hoopoe-like bird perched on a flowering branch of prunus; a red vessel seal mark lower right corner reading as Naonobu; together with a box, a label to the side with an inscription reading as 'Peach blossom tree and young chick, painted by Shoei', and a document with biographical details about the painter Kano Shoei Naonobu (1519-1592), reading as: 'his given name was Genshichiro. He was given the Hōgen title and was an official painter to Ashikaga Yoshiteru (the 13^th Ashikaga shogunate). Shoei was born in the Eisho 16^th year (1519) in Kyoto. He died on the 20^th of the 10^th month of the Bunroku 1^st year (1592) at the age of 74, and is buried at the Myokakuji Temple, Kyoto. His posthumous Buddhist name is Shuhouin Nisso Hogen Shoei Daikoji'.