Connoisseur's Book of Silk Fragments

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This album, probably compiled in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century, contains fragments of kosode from the seventeenth to nineteenth century. Precedents for compiling albums of textiles can be found among the records of tea ceremony aficionados, who preserved and studied textiles associated with the tea ceremony, such as mountings for paintings and bags for treasured utensils. The identity of the textile connoisseur who owned this album is not known. Since several of the kosode fragments in the album have counterparts among the Nomura collection's screens, it seems likely that the compiler was one of Nomura's contemporaries who took part in the avid textile collecting of the first few decades of the twentieth century.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art