Scenes of the Gion Festival in Kyoto
Artist/Culture
Japanese
Date1700–1900
Mediumwatercolor on paper
Dimensions32.4 cm (12 3/4 in.)
ClassificationsPaintings
Credit LineGift of Mrs. Robert C. Barton
Object number1970.130
Label TextThe Gion Festival is a celebration of Kyoto's Gion or Yasaka Shinto shrine that takes place in July and culminates in a parade of floats--some as high as seventy feet--on the seventeenth of the month. The festival originated in 869 A.D. when an epidemic swept the city. Sixty-sox tall spears (hoko) representing the provinces of Japan were erected, and prayers were offered. The festival was discontinued in the sixteenth century by an organization of well to do merchants (machishu). The original spears were replaced by giant wheeled floats topped by tall spear like poles. Performing musicians ride on these floats even today. Smaller floats called yama (mountains) which carry life-sized figures of historical and mythological figures are shoulder-borne.
The festival appears in paintings of the sixteenth century, particularly of the screens which focus on events and places around the capital of Kyoto (Raku-chu Rakugai zu). The Gion Festival becomes the primary subject of paintings in the folding screen format during the Momoyama period (1568-1600). Handscrolls of the Gion Festival appear in the early Edo period (seventeenth century_; by this time much of the interest in the ordinary people and places of Kyoto found in the earlier depictions have disappeared.
This painting appears to date from the late seventeenth century and is a good example of its type. The focus is on the procession itself and not on the details of the spectators and their settings. The faces of the figures inside the buildings have expression and individuality. The architecture is nicely rendered and the water is painted in a lively fashion. The floats are carefully described and the exertions of the carriers are evident in their faces and gestures.ProvenanceMrs. Robert C. Barton, Harvard MAOn View
Not on view
School of Moscow
1600s
