The beach at Miho

In depicting the pine forest at Miho—one of the famous scenic spots of Japan—Tanyu painted a solitary pine at the tip of the shore. A similar lone pine had appeared in an earlier painting of this subject by an anonymous painter. This suggests that both artists were depicting an actual scene. On the bottom of the screen, everyday activities are being conducted in a village.
An extremely prolific and important master of the Kano family school, Kano Tanyu moved from Kyoto to Edo (now Tokyo) and established a strong connection with the shogun's court. While Tanyu continued to work in Edo as an official court painter for the shogun, he also established his own branch of the Kano school. Under Tanyu's leadership, the new school gained political and artistic power in Edo.