It consists of a main rectangular structure flanked by two L-shaped wing corridors and a tail corridor, set at the edge of a large artificial pond. Inside, a single golden image of Amida (circa 1053) is installed on a high platform. The Amida sculpture was executed by J?ch?, who used a new canon of proportions and a new technique (y?segi), in which multiple pieces of wood are carved out like shells and joined from the inside. Applied to the walls of the hall are small relief carvings of celestials, the host believed to have accompanied Amida when he descended from the Western Paradise to gather the souls of believers at the moment of death and transport them in lotus blossoms to Paradise. Raig? (Descent of the Amida Buddha) paintings on the wooden doors of the H?-?-d? are an early example of Yamato-e, Japanese-style painting, because they contain representations of the scenery around Ky?to.

In the last century of the Heian period, the horizontal, illustrated narrative handscroll, the emaki, came to the fore. Dating from about 1130, the illustrated Tale of Genji represents one of the high points of Japanese painting. Written about the year 1000 by Murasaki Shikibu, a lady-in-waiting to the Empress Akiko, the novel deals with the life and loves of Prince Genji and the world of the Heian court after his death. The 12th-century artists of the emaki version devised a system of pictorial conventions that convey visually the emotional content of each scene. In the second half of the century, a different, more lively style of continuous narrative illustration became popular. The Ban Dainagon Ekotoba (late 12th century, Sakai Tadahir? Collection), a scroll that deals with an intrigue at court, emphasizes figures in active motion