Cleveland Museum of Art

Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers

Watanabe ShikōLinkedCulture matchlcp-9cf3749769aa

Date: 1700s
Medium: Six-panel folding screen; ink on paper
Culture: Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)
Department: Japanese Art
Institution: Cleveland Museum of Art
Object ID: 136419

From the Cleveland Museum of Art record

Watanabe Shiko enjoyed a versatile and successful career, as well as a privileged upbringing, in Kyoto. His surviving work indicates a capacity to diligently study, master, and then interpret several painting techniques—each of which varies considerably in appearance. These byobu (folding screens), for instance, reflect training in the Kano school idiom that favored a monochromatic ink palette, vigorous brushwork, and traditional Chinese—rather than Japanese—subject matter. Shiko rendered this scenery in a particularly expansive manner, suggesting the vastness of China's topography relative to Japan's. Frequent visitors to the museum will recall that Shiko also painted the collection's favored pair of byobu, the Irises ( CMA 1954.603 ). This screen forms a pair with CMA 1968.267 .

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Provenance & credit

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Credit line: Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Sherman E. Lee
Provenance: ?–1960: Dr. Sherman Emory Lee [1918–2008] and Ruth Ward Lee [1917–2011], Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art | 1960–: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH