Plant and Figure Sketches

柴田是真筆　人物花卉図巻
In this handscroll, the artist Shibata Zeshin sketched a variety
of people, plants, and animals in ink and pale mineral pigments
on paper. Through light, economical brushwork, each sketch
functions as a visual haiku—a minimal but evocative expression
of a moment in human life and the natural world. Zeshin, a
haiku poet, imbued many of his lacquers and paintings with the
simplicity, brevity, and attunement to nature that characterize
the haiku form.
The section of the scroll shown here depicts the following
subjects from right to left:
• Umbrella maker
• Dandelion
• Spring wildflowers and plants: violets, bracken fern fiddlehead
fronds, horsetails, shepherds purse, milk vetch, and
Japanese knotweed
• Frog by a stream