Rooster, Hen, and Chicks
Nagasawa Rosetsu 長澤蘆雪 Japanese
Calligrapher Minagawa Kien 皆川淇園 Japanese
Not on view
The rooster, representative of the patriarchal head of the family—per the Confucian ideal—was a popular subject in Chinese and Japanese painting of the premodern era. Here, the birds are silhouetted in negative white against a background of gray ink wash. Together with Itō Jakuchū (1716–1800) and Soga Shōhaku (1730–1781), Rosetsu was known as one of the “Three Eccentrics” (san kijin) of eighteenth-century Kyoto. He studied with Maruyama Ōkyo (1733–1795), founder of Kyoto’s Maruyama school.
This artwork is meant to be viewed from right to left. Scroll left to view more.