Poem by Kamo no Chōmei with Underpainting of Cherry Blossoms – (Hon'ami Kōetsu) Previous Next


Artist:

Date: 1606

Size: 20 x 18 cm

Technique: Silver

Nagamureba ni mono omou aki ni mata waga mi hitotsu no mine no matsu kaze Gazing into the distance,in a melancholy autumn mood,is it for me alone that windshowl through boughs of pineson that solitary peak? —Trans. John T. Carpenter This poem page is one of the earliest verifiable works by the influential calligrapher Hon’ami Kōetsu. The poem, included in the anthology New Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems (Shin kokin wakashū), is by the monk-poet Kamo no Chōmei (1153–1216), who was famous for his poems on cherry blossoms. Kōetsu and Tawaraya Sōtatsu produced many similar works on both individual sheets and handscrolls. Rarely do background motifs have any semantic or symbolic connection to the poems they accompany. Here, however, Kōetsu responded with élan to the decorated handscrolls and shikishi that Sōtatsu’s studio presented him to write upon.

This artwork is in the public domain.

Artist

Download

Click here to download

Permissions

Free for non commercial use. See below.

Public domain

This image (or other media file) is in the public domain because its copyright has expired. However - you may not use this image for commercial purposes and you may not alter the image or remove the watermark.

This applies to the United States, Canada, the European Union and those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 70 years.


Note that a few countries have copyright terms longer than 70 years: Mexico has 100 years, Colombia has 80 years, and Guatemala and Samoa have 75 years. This image may not be in the public domain in these countries, which moreover do not implement the rule of the shorter term. Côte d'Ivoire has a general copyright term of 99 years and Honduras has 75 years, but they do implement that rule of the shorter term.