Heron on a Willow Branch
Maruyama Ōkyo (Japanese, 1733–1795)
late 1700s
- Medium
- Two-panel folding screen; ink, color, lacquer, and gold on silk
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- Image: 69.4 x 185 cm (27 5/16 x 72 13/16 in.)
- Culture
- Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Japanese Art
- Credit line
- Bequest of Mrs. A. Dean Perry
- 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
Okyo was the most influential painter and teacher of his time in Kyoto. His mastery of brush and ink found expression in a variety of Chinese and Japanese subjects, painting styles, and formats. This depiction of a heron on a willow branch is done in a classical Japanese painting (yamato-e) style, utilizing flat areas of colorful pigments set against an expansive background with little or no spatial depth.
