WThe term "National Treasure" has been used in Japan to denote cultural properties since 1897. The definition and the criteria have changed since the inception of the term. These paintings adhere to the current definition, and were designated national treasures when the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties was implemented on June 9, 1951. As such, they are restricted in transfer and may not be exported. Owners are required to announce any changes to the National Treasures such as damage or loss and need to obtain a permit for changes in location, transfer of ownership or intended repairs. The items are selected by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology based on their "especially high historical or artistic value". This list contains 162 paintings from 7th-century Asuka period to the early modern 19th-century Edo period. In fact the number of paintings presented is more than 162, because in some cases groups of related paintings are combined to form a single entry. The paintings listed show Buddhist themes, landscapes, portraits and court scenes. Some of the paintings were imported directly from China. The titles of the works are descriptive rather than the artists' titles; therefore it is possible to find alternate names in the literature for a given work.
WChōjū-jinbutsu-giga , commonly shortened to Chōjū-giga , is a famous set of four picture scrolls, or emakimono, belonging to Kōzan-ji temple in Kyoto, Japan. The Chōjū-giga scrolls are also referred to as Scrolls of Frolicking Animals and Scrolls of Frolicking Animals and Humans in English. Some think that Toba Sōjō created the scrolls; however, it seems clear from the style that more than one artist is involved. The right-to-left reading direction of Chōjū-jinbutsu-giga is traditional in East Asia, and is still common in Japan. Chōjū-jinbutsu-giga is also credited as the oldest work of manga. The scrolls are now entrusted to the Kyoto National Museum and Tokyo National Museum.
WThe Kanō school is one of the most famous schools of Japanese painting. The Kanō school of painting was the dominant style of painting from the late 15th century until the Meiji period which began in 1868, by which time the school had divided into many different branches. The Kanō family itself produced a string of major artists over several generations, to which large numbers of unrelated artists trained in workshops of the school can be added. Some artists married into the family and changed their names, and others were adopted. According to the historian of Japanese art Robert Treat Paine, "another family which in direct blood line produced so many men of genius ... would be hard to find".
WCypress Trees is a Kanō-school byōbu or folding screen attributed to the Japanese painter Kanō Eitoku (1543–1590), one of the most prominent patriarchs of the Kanō school of Japanese painting. The painting dates to the Azuchi–Momoyama period (1573–1615). Now in Tokyo National Museum, it has been designated a National Treasure.
WFlowering Plants of Summer and Autumn (夏秋草図屏風) is a painting on a pair of two-folded byōbu folding screens by Rinpa artist Sakai Hōitsu depicting plants and flowers from the autumn and summer seasons.
WFounding of the Nation is a 1929 oil painting by Japanese yōga artist Kawamura Kiyoo (1854–1932). Based on the myth of the cave of the sun goddess from the Kojiki, the painting resides at the Musée Guimet in Paris, where it is known as Le coq blanc or The white cockerel.
WThis is a list of works by Japanese painter Fujishima Takeji (1867–1943).
WThe Broken Ink Landscape scroll is a splashed-ink landscape painting on a hanging scroll. It was made by the Japanese artist Sesshū Tōyō in 1495, in the Muromachi period. The ink wash painting is a National Treasure of Japan and is held by the Tokyo National Museum.
WHe-Gassen, or Houhi-Gassen, are titles given to a Japanese art scroll, created during the Edo period (1603–1868) by an unknown artist or several unknown artists.
WHell Scroll is a scroll depicting seven out of the sixteen lesser hells presented in Kisekyō. Six of the paintings are accompanied by text, which all begin with the phrase "There is yet another hell", following a description of what the sinners depicted did to end up in this particular hell. The seven hells depicted are the Hell of Excrement, Hell of Measures, Hell of the Iron Mortar, Hell of the Flaming Rooster, Hell of the Black Sand Cloud, Hell of Pus and Blood and Hell of Foxes and Wolves. It is considered likely that the scroll corresponds to the Paintings of the Six Paths, commissioned by Emperor Goshirakawa in the 12th century. This handscroll was preserved in Daishō-in in Higashiokubo, Tokyo until the Meiji period, when it came into the hands of the Hara family of Kanagawa, later ending up in the possession of the Japanese government.
WThe Jigoku-zoshi is a late 12th-century Japanese scroll, depicting the 8 great hells and the 16 lesser hells in text and painting.
WHikime kagibana describes a feature of illustration continuing in the repertoire of Japanese Art from the Heian period through the Kamakura period, most notably in yamato-e e-maki. Its influence can be traced right up the Edo-period ukiyo-e or later.
WIrises is a pair of six-panel folding screens (byōbu) by the Japanese artist Ogata Kōrin of the Rinpa school. It depicts an abstracted view of water with drifts of Japanese irises. The work was probably made circa 1701–1705, in the period of luxurious display in the Edo period known as Genroku bunka.
WMōko Shūrai Ekotoba is a set of two Japanese illustrated handscrolls (emakimono) composed between 1275 and 1293. They were commissioned by the samurai Takezaki Suenaga in order to record his battlefield valor and deeds during the Mongol invasions of Japan.
WThe Murasaki Shikibu Diary Emaki is a mid-13th century emaki, a Japanese picture scroll, inspired by the private diary (nikki) of Murasaki Shikibu, lady-in-waiting at the 10th/11th centuries Heian court and author of The Tale of Genji. This emaki belongs to the classical style of Japanese painting known as yamato-e and revives the iconography of the Heian period.
WQuail and Millet (粟に鶉図) is a 17th-century painting on silk by Kiyohara Yukinobu. It is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
WRed and White Plum Blossoms is an early 18th-century painting on a pair of two-panel byōbu folding screens by Japanese artist Ogata Kōrin (1658–1716). The simple, stylized composition depicts a patterned flowing river with a white plum tree on the left and a red one on the right. The plum blossoms indicate the scene occurs in spring.
WReminiscence of the Tempyō Era is a 1902 painting by yōga artist Fujishima Takeji (1867–1943). Inspired by nostalgia for the Tempyō era and, like his Butterflies and covers for the literary magazine Myōjō, an influential exemplar of Meiji romanticism, it has been designated an Important Cultural Property. It is part of the collection of the Ishibashi Foundation.
WShaka rising from the Gold Coffin (絹本著色釈迦金棺出現図) is an anonymous hanging scroll from the 11th century depicting the resurrection of Shakyamuni Buddha as described in the Mahamaya Sutra.
WShigisan-engi is an emakimono or painted handscroll made in the second half of the 12th century. The story details miracles which were attributed to the monk Myōren, who lived on Mount Shigi near Nara in Japan in the latter part of the 9th century.
WThe Pine Trees screen is a pair of six-panel folding screens (byōbu) by the Japanese artist Hasegawa Tōhaku. The precise date for the screens is not known, but they were clearly made in the late 16th century, in the Momoyama period, around 1595. The screens are held by the Tokyo National Museum, and were designated as a National Treasure of Japan in 1952.
WSpring and autumn landscapes is a pair of paintings representing spring and autumn by Japanese artist Hara Zaishō (1813–1872). It is part of the permanent collection of the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada.
WSundai, Edo is a woodblock print by the Japanese ukiyo-e artist Hokusai. It was produced as the fifth print in the series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji from c. 1830 to 1832 in the late Edo period.
WThe Tamamushi Shrine is a miniature shrine owned by the Hōryū-ji temple complex of Nara, Japan. Its date of construction is unknown, but estimated to be around the middle of the seventh century. Decorated with rare examples of Asuka-period paintings, it provides important clues to the architecture of the time and has been designated a National Treasure.
WWind God and Thunder God is a painting on a pair of two-folded byōbu by Rinpa artist Ogata Kōrin, a replica of a similar work by Tawaraya Sōtatsu, depicting Raijin, the god of lightning, thunder and storms in the Shinto religion and in Japanese mythology, and Fūjin, the god of wind.