The gently meandering stream, flowing through time and space, is unpainted except for the lines of ink that accentuate its softly curving form. A single clump of red azalea contrasts with the intense green of the pines. A glimpse of cherry blossoms in evanescent glory before they scatter on the stream marks the peak of spring, while the mountain rose (kerria) on the far bank betokens its passing.
The stream flows into autumn on the left screen, through sunlit plumes of grass and huge, already brown leaves on a magnolia tree that all but obscures the bending forms of flowering bush clover and chrysanthemum beyond. To the left, golden ginkgo leaves shimmer in the late afternoon light with bold red and white maple leaves.
The painting encapsulates stylistic features of Rinpa artists across a couple of generations, beginning with Tawaraya Sōtatsu in the early seventeenth century, and extending to Ogata Kōrin and anonymous Rinpa artists working in his wake.
(One of a pair; see 49.35.2)
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渓流春秋草木図屏風
Title:Autumn Trees and Grasses by a Stream
Period:Edo period (1615–1868)
Date:late 17th–early 18th century
Culture:Japan
Medium:One of a pair of six-panel folding screens; ink, color, gold, and silver on paper
Dimensions:48 in. x 10 ft. 3 in. (121.9 x 312.4 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1915
Object Number:15.127
[ Yamanaka & Co. , Kyoto and New York, until 1915; sold to MMA]
New York. Asia House Gallery. "Byōbu: Japanese Screens from New York Collections," January 14, 1971–March 14, 1971.
Nagoya City Museum. "Rimpa, Succession of Beauty: Sotatsu, Korin, Hoitsu, Kiitsu," April 23, 1994–May 22, 1994.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Art in Early Japan," 1999–2000.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Enlightening Pursuits," February 28–August 5, 2001.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "A Sense of Place: Landscape in Japanese Art," May 8–September 8, 2002.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Flowing Streams: Scenes from Japanese Arts and Life," December 21, 2006–June 3, 2007.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Poetry and Travel in Japanese Art," December 18, 2008–May 31, 2009.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "A Sensitivity to the Seasons: Summer and Autumn in Japanese Art," June 24–October 23, 2011.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Designing Nature: The Rinpa Aesthetic in Japanese Art," May 26, 2012–January 13, 2013.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Discovering Japanese Art: American Collectors and the Met," February 14 - September 27, 2015.
Fenollosa, Ernest F., and Mary McNeil Fenollosa. Epochs of Chinese & Japanese Art: An Outline History of East Asiatic Design. vol. 2, London: W. Heinemann, 1912.
Bosch Reitz, S. C. "The Magnolia Screen by Koyetsu." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 11, no. 1 (January 1916). pp. 10–12.
Ushikubo Daijiro. Life of Kôyetsu. [Kyoto]: Igyokudo, 1926, p. 24.
Priest, Alan. "Autumn Millet." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 17, no. 4 (December 1958. pp. 104–107 (p. 103).
Mayuyama Jun'kichi, ed. Japanese Art in the West. Tokyo: Mayuyama & Co., Ltd., 1966, p. 192, cat. no. 230A.
Akiyama Terukazu 秋山光和, Shimada Shūjirō 島田修二郎, and Yamane Yūzō 山根有三, eds. Zaigai Nihon no shihō 在外日本の至宝 (Japanese art: selections from Western collections): Rinpa. vol. 5, Tokyo: Mainichi Shinbunsha, 1979, pls. 40–41.
Tokyo Kokuritsu Bunkazai Kenkyūjo 東京国立文化財研究所, ed. Nyūyōku Metoroporitan Bijutsukan, kaiga, chōkoku ニューヨークメトロポリタン美術館，絵画・彫刻 (Painting and sculpture of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) Kaigai shozai Nihon bijutsuhin chōsa hōkoku 海外所在日本美術品調查報告 (Catalogue of Japanese art in foreign collections) 1. Tokyo: Kobunkazai Kagaku Kenkyūkai, 1991, p. 94, cat. no. 280.1.
Lawton, Thomas. "Yamanaka Sadajiro: Advocate for Asian Art Dealers." Orientations 16, no. 1 (January 1995). pp. 80–93, fig. 19.
Carpenter, John T. Designing Nature: The Rinpa Aesthetic in Japanese Art. Exh. cat. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012, p. 148, cat. no. 60.
Bincsik, Monika. "Discovering Japanese Art: American Collectors and the Met." Orientations 46, no. 2 (March 2015). pp. 118–31, fig. 4.
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