Haboku (Flung-ink) Landscape
Medium
hanging scroll; ink on paper
Dimensions
151.1 × 40.6 cm · image: 59.5 × 26.9 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Japanese Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
Accession Number
1976.59
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
About this artwork
This vague but energetically rendered landscape highlights the brush: the messenger for a moment’s emotional or spiritual state. The painting represents one of many subjects and styles Shugetsu studied and absorbed from the great practitioners of Ming-dynasty China in the late 1400s and early 1500s. The technique of "flung ink," or haboku, disguises purposeful composition as an almost random, distracted series of brushstrokes. Close inspection reveals tonalities and strokes brushed onto a soft, ...