Description
Over seven feet tall, Ōzora Buzaemon became a tabloid sensation when he arrived in Edo (Tokyo) in 1827 . His handprints were cherished souvenirs, and his image was sold on woodblock prints. As inscriptions on the scroll detail, Watanabe Kazan met Buzaemon at the residence of a noted Confucian scholar. Using a camera obscura–type device—a tool that uses light to project an image onto a surface—he made this preliminary drawing for a painting. The portrayal depicts Buzaemon’s discomfort in being stared at.
Provenance
(Mayuyama and Company, Tokyo, Japan, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art) (?–1980); The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (1980–)
Accession Number
1980.177
Medium
hanging scroll; ink and color on paper
Dimensions
Image: 221.8 x 117.8 cm (87 5/16 x 46 3/8 in.); Overall: 256.8 x 131 cm (101 1/8 x 51 9/16 in.); with knobs: 256.8 x 140.5 cm (101 1/8 x 55 5/16 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund
Tags
Painting Neoclassical & Romantic (1751–1850) Ink Paper Japanese
Background & Context
Background Story
Watanabe Kazan (1793-1841) was a Japanese painter and scholar known for the realistic portraits that combine Western perspective with Japanese painting materials, making him one of the most important painters of the late Edo period. Portrait of Ozara Buzaemon from 1827 depicts a village headman in the realistic manner that distinguishes Kazan's best portraits from the more stylized portraiture of his contemporaries. The 1827 date places this in Kazan's most productive period, when he was producing the realistic portraits that combine Western perspective and shading with Japanese painting materials.
Cultural Impact
Portrait of Ozara Buzaemon is important in the history of Japanese painting because it demonstrates the realistic manner that Kazan developed from his study of Western painting. Kazan's realistic portraits—combining Western perspective and shading with Japanese painting materials—represent one of the most important developments in the history of Japanese painting, and the 1827 portrait shows this development at its most accomplished.
Why It Matters
Portrait of Ozara Buzaemon is Kazan's realistic Japanese portraiture: a village headman rendered in the Western-influenced realistic manner that combines perspective and shading with Japanese painting materials. The 1827 portrait shows one of the most important developments in Japanese painting—the introduction of Western realism into the Japanese portrait tradition.
