Full moon, calligraphy | Ōtagaki Rengetsu 太田垣蓮月 | 1791-1875

Ōtagaki Rengetsu is an icon of women's culture in Kyoto. The daughter of a courtesan and a feudal lord, she was adopted by the head of Chion Temple in Kyoto almost as soon as she was born and worked as a young lady-in-waiting at Kameyama Castle until she was 14. There she received an excellent education, which formed the basis for her entire creative life. She married at 16 and had three children, all of whom died in childhood. At 25, she was widowed but remarried and had a daughter. However, at 32, she was widowed a second time. After that, she entered a convent and became a nun.

She was a highly gifted poet, studied painting under Matsumura Goshun, and had a close relationship with the painter Tomioka Tessai, a prominent figure in Kyoto. She was also a potterer and created a new style – still known today as Rengetsu-yaki.

Rengetsu always lived simply and in the most modest circumstances. (Legend has it that she took every piece of earthenware to the market the following day in order to afford new food.)

This full moon painting is exceptional because Rengetsu paints the moon milky white. This is completely contrary to tradition. Normally, in ink paintings, the lunar disk is represented only by the clouds surrounding the moon; it always exists, as it were, only as a negative form.

Her calligraphy style has a strong neoclassical character. She cultivates a very fine, flowing line, like the calligraphy of court ladies during the Heian period (794-1185). The Japanese consider this the epitome of elegant, feminine writing.

Her tanka poem reads: 

野に山に

うかれうかれて

かへるさを

寝屋までおくる

秋の夜の月

Translated into English:

" Across fields over mountains

floating, wavering

leads me home

to my bedroom

the evening autumn moon."