2022 New Edition: Manabu Ikeda, The Legendary Mountain
Manabu Ikeda, The Legendary Mountain, 2021. Click to view.
Drawing with a fine pen nib, Manabu Ikeda weaves elements of civilization and nature into fantastic narratives, which emanate a sense of pure curiosity and abundant imagination. His drawings are so alarmingly dense that he can only manage to complete one fist-sized area per day. However, with indefatigable patience, entire scenes gradually pile up, akin to the steady, inexorable accumulation of diary entries. It is easy to be seduced into a lengthy exploration of the minute details of Ikeda’s drawings; however, when one backs up to view the whole image, the accumulated details become not just a sprawling drawing in miniature, lacking a cohesive structure, but rather a masterfully created conglomerate of micro-narratives merged as an expansive macro world.
Ikeda has greatly admired Yokoyama Taikan’s paintings that depict oceans, mountains, and clouds for many years, and Yokoyama’s artwork inspired Ikeda’s new print edition. The Legendary Mountain is a solar plate etching and is the largest print that Ikeda has ever created.
In The Legendary Mountain, a landscape with high mountain ranges emerges from the surrounding clouds and an ocean of crashing waves. In the center of the image lies a large cruise ship perched precipitously on top of a mountain peak. Appearing quite small, the ship is dwarfed by the soaring mountains, cliffs, and the malevolent seas. The foreboding atmosphere created by cloudy and windy skies, snowy mountain peaks, and crashing waves intensifies the dangerous predicament of the ship and its passengers.
Ikeda references the fabled Mount Horai in this image, a subject that Yokoyama Taikan also painted many times. Japanese mythology describes Mount Horai as a mysterious mountain that sometimes floats on the ocean or up in the clouds. The legend of the mountain tells the story of an emperor who became very ill. He sent a Buddhist monk out to find a cure for his illness. The monk was carried by a phoenix to a palace on Mount Horai where he spent seventeen days and nights praying until the emperor recovered. It is thought that spirits that have a magical healing potion reside on the mountain.
In Ikeda’s The Legendary Mountain, a fictional ship has somehow found itself stranded on the top of the mountain. The fate of the ship’s passengers is unsure. Will they ever be found by their friends and families? Will a spirit bring them the potion that can grant them immortality or will they, along with their vessel, be lost forever? In either case, it is a stunning image created with remarkable talent.
Manabu Ikeda signing the completed prints of The Legendary Mountain with assistance by Collaborative Printmaker Joe Freye
