Genpei No.-17

A numbered entry in Takeda's extended Genpei series, drawing on the 1180–1185 war between the Taira and Minamoto clans that ended with the founding of the Kamakura shogunate. Without a specified episode in the title, the print likely treats one of the war's recorded engagements — Ichi-no-tani, Yashima, Dan-no-ura — or an individual warrior episode from the Heike Monogatari. Takeda reframes material long associated with musha-e through a graphic mokuhanga vocabulary: flat color planes, strong outline, restrained palette, and considerable negative space on the washi sheet. The series places Takeda in dialogue with Kuniyoshi and his Edo-period successors who repeatedly mined the Genpei narrative, while marking a clear departure in compositional density. Where nineteenth-century triptychs crowd the picture plane with figures, armor, and inscriptions, Takeda isolates motifs and lets the carved line carry narrative weight.