Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)

Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)

Kubo Shunman

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Surimono are privately published woodblock prints, usually commissioned by individual poets or poetry groups as a form of New Year’s greeting card. The poems, most commonly kyōka (witty thirty-one syllable verse), inscribed on the prints usually include felicitous imagery connected with spring, which in the lunar calendar begins on the first day of the first month. Themes of surimono are often erudite, frequently alluding to Japanese literary classics in both texts and images. As on the print on the facing page, the inspiration for this design was a chronicle of Kamakura. Both places alluded to in the title are in nearby Yokohama, which served as the eastern gateway of the ancient military capital. Both the Kanazawa Library and the Shōmyōji Temple, founded in the thirteenth century, remain in use today.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)Spring Rain Collection (Harusame shū), vol. 1: “Books from Kanazawa Library” (Kanazawa Bunko) and “Foreign Cat of Shōmyōji Temple” (Shōmyōji no kara neko), from the series History of Kamakura (Kamakura shi)

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.