Description
This lively scene captures a gathering of stock figures from Otsu-e, or "Otsu paintings." Otsu-e were folk paintings made as souvenirs for travelers passing through the station of Otsu along the Tokaido, the route stretching from Edo (modern-day Tokyo) to Kyoto. Parodies of standard ukiyo-e compositions featuring Otsu-e subjects were popular in woodblock prints of the 19th century. Shibata Zeshin, an artist whose career spanned the transition from the Edo period (1615–1868) to the Meiji period (1868–1912), was fond of depicting urban culture and the pastimes of commoners, aware that they were slipping away in the face of Japan’s modernization. This composition would have appealed to the witty sensibilities of city denizens.
Provenance
(Marion Hammer, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art) (?–1982); The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (1982–)
Accession Number
1982.9
Medium
Eight-panel folding screen; ink and color on hemp
Dimensions
Image: 101 x 396 cm (39 3/4 x 155 7/8 in.); Overall: 170 x 336 cm (66 15/16 x 132 5/16 in.); Closed: 170 x 11.7 x 61.6 cm (66 15/16 x 4 5/8 x 24 1/4 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
John L. Severance Fund
Tags
Painting Neoclassical & Romantic (1751–1850) Ink Panel Painting Japanese
Background & Context
Background Story
Shibata Zeshin (1807-1891) was a Japanese painter and lacquerer known for the precisely observed, elegantly composed paintings and lacquerwork that make him one of the most important artists of the late Edo and Meiji periods. Gathering of Otsu-e Subjects from the late 1800s depicts a gathering of Otsu-e (Otsu folk painting) subjects in the precisely observed, elegantly composed manner that distinguishes Zeshin's best work from the more general painting of his contemporaries. The Otsu-e subjects—simple folk paintings sold to travelers at Otsu on the Tokaido road—show Zeshin's ability to combine the folk tradition with the elegant composition that is his most distinctive contribution.
Cultural Impact
Gathering of Otsu-e Subjects is important in the history of Japanese painting because it demonstrates Zeshin's ability to combine the folk tradition of Otsu-e with the elegant composition that is his most distinctive contribution. Zeshin's precisely observed, elegantly composed paintings—combining the folk tradition with the refined manner of one of the most important artists of the late Edo and Meiji periods—represent one of the most accomplished traditions in Japanese painting, and the late 1800s painting shows this tradition at its most precisely observed.
Why It Matters
Gathering of Otsu-e Subjects is Zeshin's elegant folk tradition: Otsu-e subjects rendered in the precisely observed, elegantly composed manner of one of the most important artists of the late Edo and Meiji periods. The late 1800s painting shows Zeshin's ability to combine the folk tradition with the refined composition that is his most distinctive contribution.
