VICTORIA, BC, CANADA.-The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria presents Japanese Paintings of the Kano & Tosa Schools, on view through October 30, 2005. This exhibition focuses on the two traditional Japanese painting schools of Tosa and Kano, which both formed in the Muromachi period (1392-1573).

The Tosa School was patronized by the Imperial Court who were largely figureheads with little power during the shogunate periods. This school used the traditional yamoto-e style to portray scenes from Japanese classics and poetry. A spectacular painting in this exhibition, The Defilement of Human Existence, has been attributed to the greatest painter of the school, Tosa Mitsuoki (1617-1691).

The Kano School, in contrast, worked under the sponsorship of the powerful shoguns, and as a result were much more prosperous and influential. The Kano style, although Chinese-looking in subject matter and in its ink monochrome medium, was really a very Japanese form of expression. The simple direct style was representative of the Japanese sense of beauty. This school produced generation after generation of outstanding painters, who formed the backbone of the art scene in Japan from the 15th to 19th centuries. Two of the greatest Kano painters, Sanraku Kano (1559-1635) and Kano Tanyu (1602-1674) are represented in this exhibiton.