Medium: Six-panel folding screen: ink on silk
Dates:late 19th – early 20th century
Dimensions: image, each: 28 1/8 × 10 5/8 in. (71.5 × 27 cm) Overall: 62 3/16 × 101 9/16 in. (158 × 258 cm)
Collections:
Accession Number: L2022.2.6
Image: L2022.2.6.jpg,
Catalogue Description: Six discontinuous compositions depicting branches of flowering plum trees, each image accompanied by a poem in Chinese characters (to be translated). The plum trees are gnarled and crooked, reaching across the panels in various directions with the ink work emphasizing a sharp contrast between the angularity of the branches and the roundness of the plum blossom buds. The artist also contrasts the "flying white" of a drier brush stroke used for older branches of the tree with the wetter brush strokes used for younger, greener parts of the tree. The paintings do not appear to have been signed or sealed. Plums are among the first trees to blossom in the late winter, and are as such an important emblem of rebirth and hope.