A INK, COLOURS AND GOLD ON PAPER SIX-PANEL FOLDING SCREEN

Japan, 19th century

The screen depicts a lively battle scene, set in a landscape with the fortifications of a castle on the left, a camp at the top right and rocky peaks on the upper side, the entire scene divided by the swirling flow of a stream, while a large number of samurai face each other with swords and spears.

172 x 360 cm

Provenance: Italian private collection.

The armed clash described on this fine and powerful screen is the one that took place on 10 September 1561 in the Kawanakajima plain in the province of Shinano, today's prefecture of Nagano, which saw the troops of Takeda Shingen, lord of the province of Kai, facing those of Uesugi Kenshin, lord of Echigo province. This war event was only the bloodiest of a series of clashes which saw the armies of the two rival daimyo confronting each other in those same places and in the space of a few years, remembered for the huge number of human losses on both sides and for the sophisticated military tactics that guided the actions of the two armies, frequently used as the subject of works of art in the following centuries and still a source of inspiration for films, television series and videogames.