Landscapes of the Four Seasons

Landscapes of the Four Seasons

Kano Tan'yū

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

At far right, a stream fed by melting snow comes tumbling down out of the mountains, symbolizing the onset of spring. This foreground of waterfalls, bent trees, and rooftops suddenly gives way to an expanse of blank paper—a diagonal swath of mist that parts to reveal distant summer mountains. A flock of geese and the large moon are the only indications of autumn in the left screen (not exhibited), which is dominated by icy mountains and a snow-covered village. A grandson of the great Momoyama painter Kano Eitoku (1543–1590), Kano Tan’yū had, by the time he was a teenager, already become official painter to the second Tokugawa shogun Hidetada (1579– 1632; reigned 1605–1623). This pair of screens is dated on stylistic grounds to the 1630s, when Tan’yū was head of the Kano school’s Kajibashi atelier in Edo, which Tan’yū himself had established in 1621.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Landscapes of the Four SeasonsLandscapes of the Four SeasonsLandscapes of the Four SeasonsLandscapes of the Four SeasonsLandscapes of the Four Seasons

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.