Painting is the art which, more than any other, including sculpture, has always provided the best
medium for the expression of Japanese sensibilities. The reasons for this are difficult to determine. It
may be largely due to the picturesque nature of Japan itself where the landscape at times seems almost to
create the impression of a bright, decorative pattern. At other times its humid atmosphere envelops
the countryside in a silvery mist which dissolves mountains, forests, and trees into nuances of grey and
in which the shadows and outlines are always changing. The artistic genius of the Japanese finds its
most natural expression in painting. In sculpture, except for those periods when Japan was in close
contact with China and engaged in the earnest assimilation of continental styles, her plastic sense
tended to lose a three-dimensional quality and to fall into frontality and flatness. The sculpture of the
Heian period when Japan was intent on the Japanization of her cultural life shows this tendency most
clearly.

However, Japanese painters, always show a freedom and ease which reflects the artists' complete
independence and confidence in their powers. Of course, the materials and basic techniques again
came from China. Water-colours and ink on paper or silk are fundamental methods that have been
employed in Japan for twelve hundred years and are still very much alive. They have given Japanese
painting characteristics which distinguish it from the rest of the world's painting. Much of its beauty
can be attributed to the unique combination of individual national character, materials, and techniques.

Basically two techniques predominate--first, painting in water-colours and second, painting in sumi
(Chinese ink), which produces all its effects purely in black and white and in intermediate nuances
of grey. Painting in colour started in the Nara period with the introduction of the colourful Buddhist
paintings of the T'ang Dynasty, from which the Japanese imitated both their materials and technique.
During the Heian period this type of painting was used in Japan for large-scale Buddhist paintings.
From these gradually developed a secular art with a distinctly Japanese character which is distinguished
by the name Yamato-e or quite simply 'Japanese painting'. It became extremely popular and has always
remained the main current of Japanese painting.

It is important here to dwell on the nature of these water-colours in more detail. The westerner
immediately thinks of water-colours as British water-colours. These, however, are quite different from
the water-colours of the east. Water is indeed used as a solvent, but the colours are much more akin
to tempera, more correctly speaking to the tempera a secco of the early Italian Renaissance. It is interesting
to observe how the similarity of material has even resulted in a similarity of feeling and expression. The
art of wall-painting provides an excellent example. In the east, as in Italy, the ground is prepared with
a white plaster and the colours applied on it have an opaque quality which is produced by the white
with which they are mixed. Unlike oil painting, these tempera-like colours dry quickly and tend to
produce forms which emphasize line and particularly outline. When applied to silk or paper the
same linear emphasis prevails. Line thus plays a most important part in eastern water-colour painting
in contrast to western oil painting which stresses tone and chiaroscuro. The mixture of opaque white
with colours produces a distinctive soft and hazy effect. This is quite different from the brilliance and

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