Artwork Analysis Blog Post (Due October 21, 2020)

 


The Heian period was a significant period in Japanese artistic culture, defined by elegance, opulence, and poetic expression. Illustrated Legends of the Kitano Tenjin Shrine (Kitano Tenjin engi emaki), a thirteenth-century piece from this very period, illustrated a Japanese legend that aggrieved spirits could bend forces of nature to their will.

In this particular piece, the death of scholar and poet Sugawara no Michizane following his unjust exile is believed to have made his spirit restless. Therefore, according to legend, his spirit brought upon natural disasters and diseases, only to be curbed once a shrine was dedicated to his memory and he was deified as the god of agriculture (and later would become associated with literature, learning, and music, presumably due to his being a poet and a scholar when he was alive).

 

Works Cited

Dr. Sonia Coman, "A brief history of the arts of Japan: the Jomon to Heian periods," in Smarthistory, December 2, 2019, accessed October 20, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/japan-jomon-heian/.

Borgen, Robert. "Michizane as Tenjin." In Sugawara No Michizane and the Early Heian Court, 307-36. Cambridge (Massachusetts); London: Harvard University Asia Center, 1986. Accessed October 20, 2020. doi:10.2307/j.ctt1tg5m1m.13.


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