Fujisan zu (Mount Fuji)

Morikawa Kyoriku

Mid-Edo Period (17^th century)

This work was painted by Morikawa Kyoriku, a samurai of the Hikone Domain in the Omi Province (present-day Hikone city, Shiga prefecture) who served the Ii clan. A man of many talents, Kyoriku excelled in Chinese poetry and the Kano school style of painting. Drawn to Basho’s haiku poetry even before meeting him in person, he became a disciple of Basho’s in 1692, two years before Basho’s death, when he accompanied his feudal master to Edo for the sankin-kotai (“alternate-year residence”) policy mandated by the Tokugawa Shogunate. Kyoriku signs this painting with a rakkan seal which reads “Gorosei Kyoriku.” Gorosei is the name Kyoriku gave to a hut he built in Hikone, as well as the haiku name that he sometimes used for himself.