Classical Japanese Art

Before and alongside the popular woodblock print, Japanese art moved between devotion, courtly refinement and bold decoration. Buddhist sculpture and painting arrived from Korea and China and took on a native calm; the Heian court developed narrative handscrolls steeped in poetry; and in the Momoyama and Edo periods painters of the Kano and Rinpa schools covered folding screens with gold leaf, pines, waves and seasonal flowers. Tea ceramics and lacquer brought the same eye for asymmetry and material into everyday ritual.