Waves at Matsushima, painted in the 1620s, is considered by some to be Sōtatsu's masterwork. is a handscroll decorated by Sōtatsu using silver and gold pigment, with calligraphy by
Hon'ami Kōetsu. It contains some of the finest calligraphy by Kōetsu and one of the best examples of Sōtatsu's decorative skills. The visual motif is that of cranes, which stand or fly in flocks across the entire length of the scroll. is a pair of two-folded screens made using ink and color on gold-foiled paper. It depicts
Raijin, the god of lightning, thunder and storms in the
Shinto religion and in
Japanese mythology, and
Fūjin, the god of wind. The screens have no inscription or seal, but its attribution to Tawaraya Sotatsu is not questioned. All three versions of the work were displayed together for the first time in seventy-five years in 2015, at the
Kyoto National Museum exhibition "Rinpa: The Aesthetics of the Capital". Details about the ownership of this painting prior to its purchase by
Charles Lang Freer in 1905 from the art dealer Bunshichi Kobayashi are unknown, but it's now considered one of the finest example's of Sotatsu's use of the
tarashikomi wet-on-wet technique, in which ink is artfully pooled to create features such as the clouds. The ascending, larger dragon on one side soars towards the heavens in spring, whereas the side's dragon descends into the abyss in fall.
Dragons and Clouds == Exhibitions ==