The 105 Artworks of media Gold Leaf and containing the word nobuo sekine, gold leaf, post minimalism, 2000

The traditional Chinese subject of bamboo is given a distinctly Japanese treatment in this rendition of the four seasons. Stands of mature bamboo, leafy young bamboo plants, and tapering bamboo shoots are loosely grouped across the surface of this pair of screens, with violets and shepherd’s purse c...

Like

Buy

The focus of this composition is a young woman dressed as a gallant samurai, performing the Kabuki skit Chaya asobi, or “Teahouse Entertainments.” Her comic sidekick, the manservant Saruwaka (Young Monkey)—also played by a woman—holds a branch of maple leaves or flowers.In its earliest phase, Kabuki...

Like

Buy

Yahgulanaas named his ongoing series Coppers from the Hood for the shield-like totems, or coppers, that Haida chiefs traditionally exchanged during potlaches, communal feasts that formed the basis of the pre-colonial economy on the Northwest Pacific Coast and that are still held today. Many of the a...

Like

 

This peony fan shows the blending of literati and popular tastes in the period. Literati artists traditionally disdained a gold ground as vulgar, but Hu uses it to set off his image of the luscious peony, a flower with associations of wealth and seductive beauty.

Like

 

The Mishneh Torah is the magnum opus of Moses Maimonides, the renowned medieval philosopher. This remarkable text consolidates Jewish law into a systematic, comprehensive and accessible anthology, still consulted by rabbis and scholars today. This manuscript copy of the Mishneh Torah is one of the m...

Like

 

The massive black trunk of an ancient plum tree with bending, twisting branches spans nearly sixteen feet across four sliding panels. The reptilian old tree sprouts blossoms, which convey the atmosphere of a cold early spring morning and symbolize birth and renewal. These panels originally formed on...

Like

 

A courtesan leans against an armrest and engages her young attendant (kamuro) in conversation. Close inspection shows that the kamuro holds a small incense burner from which a thin line of smoke is rising, and the courtesan presents her right hand as though requesting the kamuro to hand it to her.Ka...

Like

 

In the center of the miniature, the Virgin sits on the ground with seven swords piercing her, each symbolizing one of the events related to Christ that brought her sorrow. The theme of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin was meant to draw the viewer into Mary/

Like

Buy

The Table of Affinity serves as a pendant to the Table of Consanguinity in the section on matrimony in Gratian/

Like

 

Many artists and poets of the East and West alike have striven to capture the transitory and fleeting image of swelling waves. Kōrin’s rendition—one of Japan’s most striking representations of this amorphous, ungraspable form—has a strangely menacing feel, due no doubt to the long, tentacle-like fin...

Like

Buy

Across a brilliant gold-leaf background, the artist fashioned a wide undulating line from traditional Japanese paper (washi) soaked in ink and crushed-shell pigment (gofun) and then pressed into compact folds. The pair of screens is titled Kyoku, which in Japanese can mean “bend,” “curve,” “music,” ...

Like

 

Traditional methods of landscape painting are invoked by Hu in this fan. Mountain forms are built using a system of brush dabs, while forests are created by an assembly of ideogram trees. Dilute ink and pale colors soften the rigor of the traditional conception, producing work with an easy popular a...

Like

 

This evocative vignette is signed by a certain Lu Kezheng, an obscure artist who has gone unrecorded in histories of Chinese painting. Centering the composition on the lower half of the fan, Lu left the top shrouded in mist, creating a feeling of suspense by withholding a view into the far distance....

Like

Buy

As the sixth trumpet sounds in the Apocalypse, Saint John, seen in the right margin, hears a voice from the golden altar. The illuminator identified the voice as the Lord/

Like