Autumn Festival on a Mountain

Okada Hankō

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This tall, narrow composition rendered in the Chinese literati-influenced manner of the Nanga school features distant towering peaks, a pavilion in the middle ground, and tiny figures meandering along mountain paths and a foreground bridge. The image is gently reminiscent of Chinese literati paintings of scholar-gentlemen in a mountain setting. Washes of color endow the scene with an atmosphere of seasonal change, a quality that combines with soft, parallel brushstrokes on foliage and rocks, and the rounded contours of the mountains to give a sense of warmth and lyricism that is distinctive to much of Hankō’s landscape painting. Hankō, a third-generation Nanga artist, was the son of one of the school’s great second-generation masters, Okada Beisanjin (1744–1820). The poetic nature of his work contrasts with his father’s more spontaneous-looking, often linear landscape scenes.

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