The Cleveland Museum of Art
Collection Online as of April 25, 2024
Dragon and Tiger
c. 1546–56
(Japanese, c. 1492–c. 1577)
Painting: 157.3 x 339 cm (61 15/16 x 133 7/16 in.); Framed: 172.3 x 354 cm (67 13/16 x 139 3/8 in.)
Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1959.136.1
Location: not on view
Did You Know?
Sesson's dragon, winding in and out of clouds, may have taken inspiration from Chinese Ming-dynasty works in the style of 13th-century Chinese painter Chen Rong.Description
In Chinese cosmology, dragons produce rain clouds. The dragon disappearing into and reemerging from clouds in this painting seems to generate rough waves in the water below, pulling it toward the sky. The shape of the foreground wave is indirectly sampled from a painting by 13th-century Chinese painter Yujian, a handscroll once owned by the Ashikaga military rulers of Japan. Sesson must have known the famous painting though copies, and made a copy of his own. Here, the wave reinforces the powerful quality of the dragon.- H. Mitsui; C. Satomi.?-1959(Howard Hollis and Co., Cleveland, OH, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)1959-The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH, 1959-present
- Japan. Commission imperiale a l"Exposition universelle de Paris, 1900. . Kōhon Nihon Teikoku bijutsu ryakushi. Tōkyō: Nihon Bijutsusha, 1908. Mentioned: [p. 160]; Reproduced: p. 161Lee, Sherman E. Japanese Decorative Style. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1961. Mentioned: p. 50; reproduced: 51; cat. no. 47 archive.orgThe Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 279 archive.orgThe Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 279 archive.orgShimizu, Yoshiaki, and Carolyn Wheelwright. Japanese Ink Paintings from American Collections: The Muromachi Period: an Exhibition in Honor of Shūjirō Shimada. Princeton, NJ: Art Museum, Princeton University: Distributed by Princeton University Press, 1976. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 27, pp. 206–211The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 377 archive.orgLee, Sherman E., Michael R. Cunningham, and Ursula Korneitchouk. One Thousand Years of Japanese Art (650-1650): From the Cleveland Museum of Art: Catalogue. New York: Japan Society, 1981. Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 68–69, no. 36Tōyō kaiga no seika: tokubetsuten: Kurīvurando Bijutsukan no korekushon kara [東洋絵画の精華: 特别展: クリーヴラント美術館のコレクションから= Highlights of Asian painting from the Cleveland Museum of Art]. Nara, Japan: Nara National Museum, 1998. Reproduced: p.114-115, cat. no. 76Cunningham, Michael R. Unfolding Beauty: Japanese Screens from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2001. Reproduced: pp. 14-15Admired from afar: masterworks of Japanese painting from the Cleveland Museum of Art [クリーブランド美術館展 : 名画でたどる日本の美 Kurīburando Bijutsukan ten: meiga de tadoru Nihon no bi ]. Tokyo: Tōkyō Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan, 2014. Reproduced: cat. no. 28, p. 84, 86Feltens, Frank, Yukio Lippit, and Aaron M. Rio. Sesson Shūkei: A Zen Monk-Painter in Medieval Japan. Washington, DC: Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian, 2021. Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 43–47, fig. 13; pp. 184–185, no. 10
- Admired from Afar: Masterworks of Japanese Painting from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, Japan (January 15-February 23, 2014); Kyushu National Museum, Fukuoka, Japan (July 8-August 31, 2014).Streams and Mountains Without End: Asian Art and the Legacy of Sherman E. Lee at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 27-August 23, 2009).Highlights of Asian Paintings from The Cleveland Museum of Art. Nara National Museum (organizer) (February 21-March 29, 1998); Suntory Museum of Art (April 28-June 21, 1998).Japanese Ink Painting. Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, Japan (organizer) (October 13-November 23, 1987).Japanese Ink Paintings from American Collections: The Muromachi period: An exhibition in honor of Shūjirō Shimada. The Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ (April 25–June 13, 1976).Japanese Decorative Style. The Cleveland Museum of Art (August 30-October 15, 1961); The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (November 9-December 17, 1961).
- {{cite web|title=Dragon and Tiger|url=false|author=Sesson Shūkei|year=c. 1546–56|access-date=25 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}
Source URL:
https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1959.136.1