Minneapolis Institute of Art

Chinese Children Playing with an Elephant [left of a pair]

Style of Nagasawa Rosetsu

Date

late 18th–mid 19th century

Medium

Six-panel folding screen, one of a pair, ink and gold on paper

Department

Asian Art

Institution

Minneapolis Institute of Art

A throng of children, identifiable as Chinese by their clothing and hairstyles, play in and around a hulking, yet jolly, white elephant. In the left screen, children play a traditional Japanese game called kotoro-kotoro (“Capture the Child”), in which players line up behind a “parent” who flails his arms trying to keep a “demon” from capturing his “children.” Several tense parent-demon encounters can be found here. Although Rosetsu first studied in the studio of the realist master Maruyama Ōkyo, he was famously kicked out for bad behavior. This story, in addition to offbeat compositions and occasionally unorthodox techniques, helped Rosetsu gain a reputation as an eccentric. Asia

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