↗Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) · early 1830s
South Wind, Clear Sky, from Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji
Katsushika Hokusai
Source: ColBase — Tokyo National Museum
Image licence: CC BY 4.0 · Web image resized for display. · Museum record & image source ↗
Japan · 18th century
Writing Box with the Yatsuhashi Bridge
- Date
- 18th century
- Medium
- Lacquered wood with maki-e, lead, and mother-of-pearl inlay
- Dimensions
- Not listed in the source consulted
- Country / context
- Japan
- Movement / tradition
- Japanese art and printmaking
- Collection
- Tokyo National Museum
- Pathway
- Japanese art and printmaking ↗
ABOUT THIS WORK
Lead bridge planks cross dark lacquer, while gold and mother-of-pearl form the irises. The motif refers to the Eight-Plank Bridge in The Tales of Ise. Compare the image across the lid and sides: a familiar literary subject becomes a design shaped by a functional writing box.
Original educational overview · based on the linked museum recordA MOMENT TO LOOK
Start with what you can see: shapes, surface, colour and scale. How might the listed materials affect the way this object was made and experienced?
Looking prompt · an invitation to observe, not a historical interpretation.Follow a connection.
Explore the tradition ↗↗
↗Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) · 1833
Driving Rain at Shōno, from Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaidō
Utagawa Hiroshige
↗Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) · c. 1793
The Flirtatious Type, from Ten Types in the Physiognomy of Women
Kitagawa Utamaro
↗Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) · c. 1830
A Low Tide Pentaptych
Utagawa Kuniyoshi