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Gallery Text

Inebriation was celebrated among literati as a means of transcending social and artistic boundaries. Gyokudō is often said to have painted while drunk, although it is unclear whether his intoxication was actual or metaphorical. The drunken persona reflects his commitment to the literati ideals of naturalness and amateurism reflected in this microcosmic landscape, inhabited by a solitary traveler crossing a bridge in the foreground. Rounded peaks loom over the front of the picture plane, threatening, despite their diminutive size, to engulf the viewer in a mass of frenzied ink work.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
TL42642.13
People
Uragami Gyokudō 浦上玉堂, Japanese (Bizen 1745 - 1820)
Title
A Thousand Mountains in Deep Verdure
Other Titles
Original Language Title: 千山萬翠 Senzan bansui
Classification
Paintings
Work Type
hanging scroll, painting
Date
c. 1810
Places
Creation Place: East Asia, Japan
Period
Edo period, 1615-1868
Culture
Japanese
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/340399

Location

Location
Level 2, Room 2600, East Asian Art, East Asian Painting and Decorative Arts
View this object's location on our interactive map

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Hanging scroll; ink on paper
Dimensions
image only: 35 x 37.1 cm (13 3/4 x 14 5/8 in.)
with mount: 138 x 54.3 cm (54 5/16 x 21 3/8 in.)
display dimensions: 142.9 x 63.5 cm (56 1/4 x 25 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • signature: 玉堂 [Gyokudō]
  • seal: upper; rectangular, relief: 琹王 [Lord of the Zither]
  • seal: lower; square, intaglio: 白髯琹士 [White-Haired Zither Master]

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Promised gift of Robert S. and Betsy G. Feinberg
Object Number
TL42642.13
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Uragami Gyokudo Shinsekishu (Tokyo, Japan, 1956), vol. 3, illus. #193
  • Chiba City Museum of Art and The Okayama Prefectural Museum of Art, ed., Uragami Gyokudo, exh. cat. (Okayama, Japan, 2006), illus. #160 p. 147
  • The Flowering of Edo Period Painting: Japanese Masterworks from the Feinberg Collection, exh. cat., Yomiuri Shinbunsha (Tokyo, 2013), p. 85, cat.32
  • Rachel Saunders, "Painting Edo: Japanese Art from the Feinberg Collection", Orientations, Orientations Magazine (Hong Kong, January/February 2020), vol. 51, no. 1, pp. 20-33, p. 28, fig. 8
  • Rachel Saunders and Yukio Lippit, Painting Edo: Selections from the Feinberg Collection of Japanese Art, exh. cat. (Cambridge, MA, 2020), p. 59, fig. 47
  • Rachel Saunders, ed., Catalogue of the Feinberg Collection of Japanese Art, brochure, Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, 2021), p. 63, cat. 52

Exhibition History

Subjects and Contexts

  • Google Art Project

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Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu