The Four Accomplishments
Within a landscape of towering pines, distant peaks, and roaring waterfalls are four scenes of human activity, each alluding to one of the four pursuits deemed appropriate for Chinese gentlemen: music, the board game Go, calligraphy, and painting.
Motonobu, second-generation head of the Kano School of painting, laid the groundwork for the school’s centuries of dominance over mainstream Japanese painting. One of his many achievements was the adaptation of small-scale paintings (like fans and albums) associated with specific Chinese masters to large-scale painting formats such as folding screens and panels. Here, Motonobu employs brush techniques associated with the Southern Song Chinese court painter Xia Gui (active ca. 1195–1225). ).
Motonobu, second-generation head of the Kano School of painting, laid the groundwork for the school’s centuries of dominance over mainstream Japanese painting. One of his many achievements was the adaptation of small-scale paintings (like fans and albums) associated with specific Chinese masters to large-scale painting formats such as folding screens and panels. Here, Motonobu employs brush techniques associated with the Southern Song Chinese court painter Xia Gui (active ca. 1195–1225). ).
Artwork Details
- 琴棋書画図屏風
- Title: The Four Accomplishments
- Artist: Kano Motonobu 狩野元信 (Japanese, 1477–1559)
- Period: Muromachi period (1392–1573)
- Date: mid-16th century
- Culture: Japan
- Medium: Pair of six-panel folding screens; ink and color on paper
- Dimensions: Image (each screen): 67 in. × 12 ft. 6 in. (170.2 × 381 cm)
- Classification: Paintings
- Credit Line: Dr. and Mrs. Roger G. Gerry Collection, Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Roger G. Gerry, 1991
- Object Number: 1991.480.1, .2
- Curatorial Department: Asian Art
More Artwork
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Kano Motonobu 狩野元信
first half 16th century
Sesson Shūkei 雪村周継
ca. 1570
Japan
late 16th century
Kano Mitsunobu 狩野光信
late 16th century
Uto Gyoshi
mid- to late 16th century
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