The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 1, 2023

Susuki Grass

芒野図屏風

c. 1525

Part of a set. See all set records

Japan, Muromachi period

(1392–1573)

One of a pair of six-panel folding screens; ink, color, and gold on paper

Image: 150.4 x 349.2 cm (59 3/16 x 137 1/2 in.); Overall: 163.6 x 362.4 cm (64 7/16 x 142 11/16 in.); Panel: 163.6 x 60.4 cm (64 7/16 x 23 3/4 in.); with frame: 166.8 x 365.6 cm (65 11/16 x 143 15/16 in.)

John L. Severance Fund 1984.43.1

Location

not on view

Description

Susuki grass has a seasonal association with autumn in the Japanese visual and literary tradition. It is one of the “Seven Flowers of Autumn,” along with bush clover, arrowroot, pink, patrinia, mistflower, and bellflower. This composition immerses the beholder in a field of grasses and golden bands of mist. The design may have served as a backdrop for poems brushed in calligraphy on decorated papers and attached to the surface of the screens.

Provenance
?–1984
(Eastern Fine Arts, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)
1984–
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Citations
Cunningham, Michael R. The Triumph of Japanese Style: 16th-Century Art in Japan. [Cleveland, Ohio]: Published by the Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with the Indiana University Press, 1991. Reproduced: pp. 38-39
Bromfield, David. Monet & Japan. Canberra: National Gallery of Australia, 2001. Reproduced: cat. no. 122, pp. 166–167
Cunningham, Michael R. Unfolding Beauty: Japanese Screens from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2001. Reproduced: pp. 10-11
Cunningham, Michael R. "Letter to the Editor." Impressions 34 (2013): 261-264. Reproduced: fig. 1, p. 263
Admired 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. 27, p. 82-83
Sakomura, Tomoko. Poetry As Image: The Visual Culture of Waka in Sixteenth-Century Japan. Leiden: Brill, 2016. Reproduced: pp. 22–23, fig.12
Longhi, Leighton R. Leighton R. Longhi: Forty-Five Years in Asian Art. [New York, N.Y.]: Leighton R. Longhi, 2019. Reproduced: pp. 96–97, fig. 74
Exhibition history

Year in Review for 1984. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 3-May 5, 1985).

Byobu: The Art of the Japanese Screen. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 8, 1987-January 10, 1988).

Autumn Grasses: Arts of the Momoyama Period (1573-1615). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 4-December 11, 1988).

Rimpa Painting. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 19-December 17, 1989).

The Triumph of Japanese Style: 16th Century Art in Japan. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 19-December 1, 1991).

Monet & Japan. National Gallery of Australia, Canberra ACT 2601, Australia (organizer) (March 10-June 11, 2001).

Unfolding Beauty: Japanese Screens from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (July 15-September 16, 2001).

Turning Point: Oribe and the Arts of Sixteenth-Century Japan. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (organizer) (October 21, 2003-January 11, 2004).

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).

Japanese Gallery 235 Rotation. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (January 7-July 8, 2019).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1984.43.1