Orchid Pavilion Gathering, by Soga Shōhaku, 1777
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Orchid Pavilion Gathering

Soga Shōhaku (Japanese, 1730–1781)

1777

Medium
hanging scroll; ink on silk
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
Painting: 122.7 x 55.7 cm (48 5/16 x 21 15/16 in.); Mounted: 197.4 x 58.8 cm (77 11/16 x 23 1/8 in.)
Culture
Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art, Japanese Art
Credit line
Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
Rights
Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it
Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed

View at the Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

This painting depicts a famous gathering that took place in China in AD 353 to celebrate the Spring Purification Festival, also known as the Double Third Festival, as it takes place on the third day of the third lunar month. The host invited everyone to the Orchid Pavilion to compose poetry and drink wine. Guests floated wine cups down a nearby creek, and where they landed, people had to drink the wine and compose a poem.