Story telling paintings - Setsuga

Japanese: 説話画 - せつわが

A term that has recently come into use in Japanese art history, referring to paintings that depict a story unfolding over time. The content can be found in art from various parts of the West and the East and in different eras, but in particular, many noteworthy works have been produced in ancient and medieval Japanese painting. The themes range from commentaries on Buddhist scriptures to Buddhist legends, secular tales, true diaries and biographies, and military chronicles, and the most prominent development in terms of the form of the painting is in picture scrolls, but also in booklet paintings, hanging scrolls, and screen paintings. The viewer is helped to understand the plot of the story by writing text corresponding to each painting in the form of a legend or shikishi form, or by a commentator orally explaining the pictures.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia About Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia Information

Japanese:

時間的に展開する物語を表現した絵画をさし，日本の美術史で近年用いられはじめた用語。内容的には西洋や東洋の各地，各時代の美術にも存在するものであるが，特に日本の古代・中世絵画において注目すべき多くの作品を生んでいる。その主題は仏教経典の解説から仏教伝説，世俗説話，実録的な日記や伝記，軍記の類までを含み，画面形式としては絵巻に最も顕著な展開を示すほか，冊子絵，掛幅，障屏画などに及ぶ。それぞれの画面に対応する文章を詞書や色紙形の形式で記入し，あるいは解説者が口誦で説明する絵解きの方法によって，鑑賞者に物語の筋を理解させた。

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