Waterfalls in Japanese Art

According to the Japanese culture, waterfalls carry a considerable symbolic significance because they are implicitly evocative of a typically Eastern connection between the mythic figure of the dragon and water, rather than fire. It is not coincidence that the ideogram that represents a waterfall somehow merges the originally separate meanings of water and dragon. Put differently, the notion of waterfall might legitimately read “water dragon”, in the sense of bring to mind a roaring dragon in the act of furiously jumping out of a slope.

In turn, the dragon, which, in traditional iconography, spits water and is covered with scales like a fish, is the metamorphic outcome of a carp. In line with a Chinese legend, a carp succeeded to move up the Yellow river waterfalls located near the Dragon Gate overcoming countless obstacles. The gods would then rewarded that persistent and bold fish, turning it into an immortal dragon.

Shintoism makes no distinction between Creator and Creation, so that the kami (deities) blend perfectly with nature. This is why all the natural elements that can convey a sense of beauty and power, as in the case of waterfalls, trees, rocks and mountains to name a few, are revered as kami, to the extent that their inherent sacredness is signposted by a suitable rope (shimenawa) marking the access. In addition, the waterfalls are especially effective in evoking astonishment and admiration, which once culminated in imbuing humanity with a sense of subjection to the divine and sacred. This human propensity was, of course, elicited by exceptionally strong and thunderous dynamics, accompanied by plays of light and colors, splash-generated mist and variously dimensioned whirlpools, the whole thing proper to the body of water involved.

Shintoism is based on the concept of purity against impurity and sin, and therefore the waterfall symbolically assumes in that religion a function of purification. Moreover, a typically Shinto-Buddhist meditation practice consists of praying beneath a waterfall (takigyo, to be understood as a part of rituals termed misogi harae). The practitioner must get up early, fast, wear a white vesture such as that for the deceased (shiroshozoku) and performing ablutions under the cold stream of a waterfall, singing mantras. In this way, the pilgrim brings himself into intimate union with nature, and meanwhile the water purifies him from the negative energies with a beneficial effect invigorating and regenerating. Anyone voluntarily willing to withstand the harshness of that practice hopes to bear life’s adversities and prepare for the end of his life in a composed way.

A further practice, notably a sports-spiritual one, consists in moving upstream along waterfalls (sawanobori) to remind the past when, in the lack of suitable links between villages, the traveler from the mountains needed by necessity of wading through rivers and climbing up to the summit of waterfalls. That adventurous traveler so felt like a pilgrim that his journeys also assumed the value of spiritual path. An ascetic rule still in force in the Yamabushi monasticism consists in living in the mountains walking barefoot, crossing rivers and immersing in waterfalls, even in winter. The highest waterfall in Japan is named Nachi no Taki near which is a shrine, destination of the ancient pilgrimage route called “Kumano Kodo”, protected by UNESCO.

It is worth additionally stressing that waterfalls also evoke the dualism between permanence and transformation since the mighty water flow remains permanently while subject to rushing streams on and on. This view is reminiscent of further summons, as it is the case both for the flow of the divine, universal conscience and the vital strength (kannagara) subject to a relentless evolution, forever. Bathing in a waterfall makes one think about a water flow that transcends divisions and borders and makes one aware that he is part of something bigger, namely of the natural order, the vastity of the universe and the endless flow of life. If in the Western humanistic culture man is the center of the universe, in the Eastern he is immersed in nature as in a unitary whole in which his individuality tends to merge, getting lost like water in a flowing river.

Katsushika Hokusai, Waterfall Kirifuri on Mount Kurokami, Shimotsuke Province (c. 1832-1833)

In his series entitled Famous Waterfalls in Various Provinces, Hokusai treats for the first time the waterfall as a traditional subject. His especially refined drawing is able to capture those important details of the waterfalls that make them readily distinguished from one another, just as in the case of portraiture. Waterfalls can resemble, as appropriate, the twisting roots of trees, long and loose hair, whitish foam, interleaved white and blue tapes. The author is prone to widespread use of Prussian blue, a then recent synthetic color imported from Europe, joined in contrast to yellow, brown and green. The given fantastic forms make you think about dream imagery, hence, a sort of interior space deprived of time rather than real scenery. Nature assumes a prevailing role in comparison to the man; however, the interest for human activity is always present even though an especially spiritual and animistic attention is paid to the natural element.

In the Kirifuri Waterfall, the vigorous water splashing is rendered by a graceful pearl-like fringing, as can be seen in The Great Wave off Kanagawa of the same author. Once again, nature is represented, likewise the Wave, as if it was an anthropomorphic subject, namely as if the waterfall was the hand of a giant, or the thousand fingers of a god of the mountains.  The adopted portrayal style turns the subject in a pure form by using an elegantly linear look bearing some resemblance to, even though more vibrant than, Liberty. It’s almost as if the natural elements have been imbued with a principle of life, something as a soul.

Without having the destructive force of the ocean’s wave, the waterfall looks impressive in size owing to the comparison with the little human figures involved in the overall scenario. The relationship between people and nature, far from being contaminated by domination as it is the case in the Western culture, can merely establish a sense of awe or contemplation. That is exactly what the three pilgrims, from behind in the foreground, feel while watching upward  with overwelming admiration (note, at the top right, a pair of figures committed to sawanobori). Notwithstanding, nature will be continuing along its imperturbable path, thus surmounting the man with indifference.

Katsushika Hokusai, The Waterfall where Yoshitsune Washed his Horse at Yoshino, Yamato Province (1833)

Attention to human activities, even in their humble everyday reality and the appreciation of ordinary people, are expressed in the scene of two men washing a horse in the Yoshino Waterfall. This detail was inspired by the legend of the warrior named Minamoto no Yoshitsune (1159–1189) which would have washed his horse in the same place while being chased by the enemies. The representation is very little heroic and much more prosaic, configuring, perhaps deliberately, a “low” style opposed to a “high”, courtly one.The human figure rendering reminds the observer of the proto-comic-strip setting typical of Manga. The immediate and urgent pragmatism of human labor clashes with the everlasting majesty and spirituality proper to nature.

Katsushika Hokusai, The Amida Falls in the Far Reaches of the Kisokaidō Road (c. 1832)

As regards Amida Waterfall, the phantasmagorical sense of the graphic layout is supplemented by the mysterious, mystic fascination stemming from the perfectly rounded shape of the rock mass on the top, almost to emulate the eye of the Buddhist deity. The fast and vigorous brushstrokes, shaping the waves of the river that is about to fall of the cliff, turn out to be a small sampling of abstract artwork embedded as a jewel in the flat disk. The latter has been compared to the moon or a bowl of rice, and, likewise the Wave, reflects Hokusai’s interest in the circular form, this being perhaps reminiscent of the religious meaning of enlightening that is typically found in the Zen Buddhism. All the composition is about an alternation of solids and voids, just like the Zen spirituality. Empty is the rounded recess in the rock; empty as a dark and unavailable custody is the free space where the towering high rocks – they are jagged as the Wave – span the waterfall. Overall, the subject brings to mind a situation of silence, detachment from the world, only interrupted by the lively scene of a daring picnic on the rock. The water mass pours in great quantity out the top and then spreads up downwards in filamentary streams guided by the natural grains of the plates made of cherry wood. The representation has a twofold perspective: the bird’s eye view captures the waterfall top and human beings on the rocks; the western-style frontal view encompasses the remaining central part.

Utagawa Hiroshige, Fudō Falls in Ōji (1857)

Hiroshige also deals with the theme of the waterfall in the work Fudō Falls in Ōji belonging to the series One Hundred Famous Views of Edo. The sense of the sacredness transmitted by the image is powerful and emanates from the perfection of the cylinder of water attracted to earth by the force of gravity. The cylinder’s volume is strongly emphasized by the use of bokashi, the shade of color from white to light blue to deep blue, which lends three-dimensionality to the image and is the result of the skill of the master printers who created pictorial effects with it. The form conceived by Hiroshige is abstract: it is no longer a waterfall, but the idea of a waterfall.

In comparison to Hokusai’s similar subject, where nature, and, in particular, water, is imagined and evoked through, that’s to say, jittery and vibrant outlines, Hiroshige’s one prefers being perceived as a pure volume, as it is the case for the perfectly smoothed out columnar geometry of the falling water. The human figures at the waterfall foot are proportionally minute. Even in Hiroshige however, as in Hokusai, man’s sense of awe with respect to nature is counterbalanced by a detailed consideration of human activities: a pair of umbrella-carrying gentlewomen with their luxuriant hairs and smartly dressed with kimonos are observing that mighty scenario while a half-naked pilgrim plunges into the pool surrounding the impacting area. An older woman, also included in that bounce of people, serves tea to a man, who just had a bath, stretching out the hand.

The monumental elements composing the scenery are accomplished by the vertical cliffs. Festoon hanging from the top of tree trunks, a sign of the sacredness of the place, almost seems both to gently frame the main subject and to give a sense of the vertical extension of the waterfall. The squared cartouche, in the top right of the printing, reporting the printing title is decorated with a stylized pattern of clouds.

Hiroshi Senju, a contemporary artist, has brought the classic waterfall subject combining the traditional Nihonga technique, through the use of washi paper and natural pigments, with a minimalistic style. His full-sized black-and-white waterfalls turn out to be a monumental rendition of the water dynamism (see cover image Falling Water, 2013, http://www.hiroshisenju.com/gallery).

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