Born at Akahama in Bitchū (Okayama); his name was Tōyō. As a child he entered nearby Hōfuku-ji.
A legend from around this time says that, tied to a pillar for drawing instead of training, he traced a mouse with his toe in his fallen tears, astonishing the abbot.
Around this time he moved to Shōkoku-ji in Kyoto, training in Zen and, it is thought, studying painting under Tenshō Shūbun, a painter-monk serving the shogunate.
Around this time he left Kyoto for the domain of the Ōuchi lords in Suō (Yamaguchi), set up the Unkoku-an studio in Yamaguchi and took the name Sesshū.
In the year the Ōnin War began, he sailed to Ming China on an Ōuchi mission ship. At the famous Tiantong temple he was granted a senior rank as a Zen monk, and in Beijing he reportedly painted a mural for a government office.
He returned having seen China's landscapes and great paintings. He reportedly said he found no painter there worth taking as master; his teachers were China's mountains and rivers themselves.
Around this time he opened the studio Tenkai Toga-rō in Bungo (Ōita). Rather than return to war-torn Kyoto, he traveled the land painting its scenery.
At 66 he painted the Long Landscape Scroll, some 16 meters long, depicting the seasons from spring to winter in one continuous scroll.
When his disciple Sōen returned home, Sesshū gave him the Splashed-Ink Landscape as a farewell gift—painted swiftly with spreading ink—and inscribed on it an account of how he had learned to paint.
Around this time, past 80, he is thought to have visited Amanohashidate in Tango (Kyoto) and painted it as if seen from the sky. Even in old age he kept traveling to paint real landscapes.
He is thought to have died around this time (year and place debated). His powerful ink paintings of Japanese nature deeply influenced later painters.
Yamana SōzenNisshinUesugi NorizaneRennyoSōgiAsakura Takakage (Toshikage)Hosokawa KatsumotoŌta Dōkan
People of the Muromachi period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.