Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

Ashmolean − Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

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Screen with spring and summer flowers

  • Description

    These screens by the samurai artist Watanabe Shikō are typical of the Rinpa style of painting. The Rinpa school emerged in Kyoto in the early 1600s and is distinctive for its dramatic compositions and bold use of gold and colours. One of the most characteristic Rinpa painting techniques is called tarashikomi, in which ink or colour is dripped onto another area of colour that is still wet, to create a softly pooled effect – ideal for depicting leaves or petals.

    Shown here are the flowers and plants of the four seasons. Japanese screens are designed to be viewed from right to left, so spring is shown on the far right of this screen, progressing through to winter on the far left of its pair [EA1970.175].

  • Details

    Associated place
    AsiaJapanHonshūKyōto prefecture Kyoto (place of creation)
    Date
    1st half of the 18th century
    Artist/maker
    Watanabe Shikõ (1683 - 1755) (artist)
    Material and technique
    puddled ink and colour (tarashikomi) and gold leaf on paper
    Dimensions
    open 173.5 x 372 x 2 cm (height x width x depth)
    individual panels 173.5 x 62 x 2 cm (height x width x depth)
    Material index
    Technique index
    Object type index
    No. of items
    1
    Credit line
    Purchased with the assistance of the MLA/V&A Purchase Grant Fund and the Art Fund, 1970.
    Accession no.
    EA1970.174
  • Further reading

    Katz, Janice, Japanese Paintings in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, with an introductory essay by Oliver Impey (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2003), p. 14

Location

    • currently in research collection

Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.

 

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