Cleveland Museum of Art

Beauty with Fireflies

Kubo Shunman

Date

early 1800s

Medium

Hanging scroll; ink and color on silk (ivory roller ends)

Culture

Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)

Department

Japanese Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

A young woman has passed beneath an aged willow tree as she strolls along a riverbank carrying a cage full of fireflies. The painting is a copy after Kubo Shunman, best known as a composer of witty verses in 31-syllables ( kyōka ) and designer of limited edition prints called surimono . Shunman was active during the mature era of ukiyo-e production, and his more formal paintings most often took as their subjects beautiful Chinese or Japanese women. Here, his imitator commemorates one of summer's most delightful evening pastimes, the observation of the flickering lights of the firefly. The woman is presented in a ubiquitous summer setting, a refreshingly cool and breezy riverbank in earshot of rustling willow leaves.

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