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Nagisa Palace from the Tales of Ise
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
This screen depicts an episode from the Tales of Ise , a 10th-century collection of poems and associated narratives in which the main character composes the following poem while drinking sake and viewing cherry blossoms: If, in this world of ours / All the cherry blossoms / Disappeared / The heart of spring / Might find peace. Our hero relaxes on a shoulder rest, gazing at the flowers, his sake dish before him on a lacquered stand. A plump boy attendant monitors the sake dishes, a ewer at the ready. An associate sits with paper, ink, and brush, poised to record poems.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineNagisa Palace from the Tales of Ise (『伊勢物語』「渚の院」図屏風), late 1800s. Shibata Zeshin (Japanese, 1807–1891). Two-panel folding screen; ink, color, lacquer, and gold on silk; image: 175.3 x 190.5 cm (69 x 75 in.); each side: 162.8 x 88.6 cm (64 1/8 x 34 7/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund, 1981.2
