Artwork Page for Pan Lang (Han Rō)

Details / Information for Pan Lang (Han Rō)

Pan Lang (Han Rō)

mid-1500s

Shikibu Terutada 式部輝忠

(Japanese, active mid-1500s)
Culture
Japan, Muromachi period (1392–1573)
Medium
Fan-shaped painting mounted as hanging scroll; ink and gold on paper
Measurements
Painting: 25 x 50 cm (9 13/16 x 19 11/16 in.); Mounted: 99.4 x 65.5 cm (39 1/8 x 25 13/16 in.)
Credit Line
Gift from the Collection of George Gund III 2015.591
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
Print

Description

These three fan-shaped paintings, now mounted as individual hanging scrolls, were once part of a set of 20 mounted on a folding screen. They portray the Chinese subjects, from left to right, of the scholar-official Pan Lang, Hanshan reciting his poetry to Shide, and a duck in flight above reeds. Pan Lang grew so fond of the mountain in his place of exile that when he was ordered back to the capital, he rode backward on his donkey so he could see it until it receded into the distance. Hanshan and Shide worked in the kitchen of a Zen monastery, but were actually reincarnations of the bodhisattvas Manjushri and Samantabhadra. The combination of a mandarin duck and reeds may have signified a level of attainment in Chinese civil service exams. All three paintings bear the seal of the Kantobased artist Shikibu Terutada. Shikibu was familiar with Kano school painting, but he also modeled his early style after that of the prominent Kanto-based Kenkō Shōkei (active about 1470–after 1523).
A fan-shaped paper painted with ink and gold depicts Pan Lang, an older man, riding a donkey. Center, he sits in light robes, looking upward toward our right. Beneath him, a gray donkey walks toward our left with its head lowered. Sparse bamboo stalks grow on the left and right. In the foreground on our left, a red seal marks a rock. The composition is set against a shimmering, gold-toned background.

Pan Lang (Han Rō)

mid-1500s

Shikibu Terutada

(Japanese, active mid-1500s)
Japan, Muromachi period (1392–1573)

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