Itō Jakuchū was born on March 2, 1716 in Yamashiro Province, Japan. He was the eldest son of Itō Genzaemon, a Kyoto grocer whose shop, called Masuya, lay in the center of downtown, in the Nishiki food district. Jakuchū ran the shop from the time of his father's death in 1739 until 1755, when he turned it over to one of his brothers.
Itō studied drawing with a painter of the Kanō school stressing Chinese subject matter and techniques.
Itō Jakuchū built a two-story studio on the west bank of the Kamo River in his late thirties. He called it Shin'en-kan (Villa of the Detached Heart), after a phrase from a poem by the ancient Chinese poet Tao Qian. It was around that time that Jakuchū befriended Daiten Kenjō, a Rinzai monk who would later become abbot of the Kyoto temple Shōkoku-ji. Through that friendship, Jakuchū gained access to the temple's large collection of Chinese and Japanese paintings and gained the introduction to new social and artistic circles.
Well-known and well-reputed in the Kyoto art community, Jakuchū received many commissions for screen paintings and was at one time featured above a number of other notable artists in the Record of Heian Notables. In addition to personal commissions, Jakuchū was also commissioned to paint panels or screens for many Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines across Japan, including the very famous and important Rokuon-ji, the monastery which includes the Kinkaku-ji Golden Pavilion on its grounds.
Despite his commercial successes, however, Jakuchū can definitely be said to have lived the life of a literary intellectual. He was a friend of many notable bunjin, went on journeys with them, and was influenced by their artistic styles. His own degree of experimentation was a result of a combination of this bunjin influence and his own personal creative drive. Most of Jakuchū's works were in the form of hanging scrolls, painted in a combination of Chinese and traditional Japanese methods and styles. A very common theme among his work was birds, in particular chickens and roosters, though several of his more famous paintings depicted cockatoos, parrots, and phoenixes.
In addition to his experiments with Western materials and perspective, Jakuchū also employed on occasion a method called taku hanga ("rubbing prints"). That method used woodblocks to resemble a Chinese technique of ink rubbings of inscribed stone slabs and was employed by Jakuchū in a number of works, including a scroll entitled "Impromptu Pleasures Afloat", depicting a journey down the Yodo River.
Despite his individualism and involvement in the scholarly and artistic community of Kyoto, Jakuchū was always strongly religious, and retired towards the end of his life to Sekihō-ji, a Manpuku-ji branch temple on the southern outskirts of Kyoto. There, he gathered a number of followers and continued to paint until his death at the age of eighty-five.
Jakuchu is particularly loved for his vivid depictions of animals, especially birds, of which there are several excellent examples. Perhaps the most impressive of the bird-themed works is “Cactus and Domestic Fowls”, a piece painted on six golden door panels from Saifuku-ji Temple in Niigata Prefecture, created in 1790. Jakuchu’s name appears second to Maruyama Okyo’s in the “Record of Heian Notables”, a kind of who’s who of Kyoto of the period, testifying to his high standing in his own time.
Roses (Bara Shou Kin Zu)
Maple Tree and Small Birds
Elephant and Whale (diptych)
Rooster and Hen with Hydrangeas
Shuto gunjakuzu
Fuyo soukeizu
Roosters
Tiger
Baika shokinzu
Lotus Pond and Fish
Plum Blossoms and Cranes
Fukurojin (Fukurokuju), the God of Longevity and Wisdom
Elephant and Whale (diptych)
Tiger
Birds, Animals, and Flowering Plants in Imaginary Scene
Settyu kinkeizu
Rōsyō hakuhō-zu
Baika kougetuzu
Octopus and Fish
Rousho oumuzu
Willow Tree and Mandarin Ducks in the Snow
Birds, Animals, and Flowering Plants in Imaginary Scene
Insects by Pond Side
Touka shoukinzu
Birds, Animals, and Flowering Plants in Imaginary Scene
Phoenix and Sun
Old Pine Tree and Peacock
One Hundred Dogs
Cactus and Roosters
Peonies and Butterflies
Chrysanthemums by a stream, with rocks
White Elephant and Animals
Chickens
Rousho Hakkeizu
Botan shoukinzu
Itō held strong ties to Zen Buddhist ideals.
Jakuchū is said to have been very calm, restrained, and professional.
