Pair of Eightfold Screens: Scenes from Tale of Genji

During the Edo period, a revival of interest in traditional Japanese literature inspired works of art illustrating the world’s oldest novel, the "Tale of Genji." Shikibu Murasaki, a lady-in-waiting at the Heian court, wrote the "Tale of Genji" in the early eleventh century, and it became a source of subject matter for paintings commissioned by wealthy townspeople in the great urban centers of Kyoto, Osaka, and Edo. Executed by professional artists trained in the Kanō or Tosa style, such paintings rely on the traditions of yamato-e (painting in the indigenous Japanese style). These traditions include conventions such as fukinuki-yatai (“blown-off roof”), in which interior scenes are shown from a bird’s-eye perspective through an open roof.

The Art Museum’s pair of screens illustrates various scenes from the fifty-four chapters of the book. (Only the right-hand screen is shown here.) At the far end, in a scene from Chapter 7, “An Autumn Excursion,” Prince Genji, the protagonist, and his brother-in-law, To no Chujo, dance before the emperor’s court during a visit to the Suzaku Palace. They perform to the accompaniment of musicians situated on Chinese-style boats on the lake. The lower left-hand side of this screen shows an illustration of a vignette from the book’s first chapter, “The Pawlonia Court,” in which the twleve-year-old Genji appears in adult robes after his initiation into manhood. Seated before a folding screen with floral decoration, the young initiate holds a falcon, one of the gifts presented to him in honor of the occasion.