Autumn Grasses in Moonlight

Meiji period (1868–1912), ca. 1872–91 - Shibata Zeshin (1807–1891)
Two-panel folding screen; ink, lacquer, and silver leaf on paper; 26 1/8 x 69 in. (66.4 x 175.3 cm)

This screen is one of the finest known from the hand of the nineteenth-century artist Shibata Zeshin.
Zeshin began his prolific and versatile career at eleven as an apprentice to a lacquer craftsman. A master of design, he was soon acclaimed as the leading artist in this painstaking and time-consuming medium, especially known for his dazzling lacquer boxes. Zeshin went on to train as a painter in a naturalistic style that shows clearly the growing influence of European realism.

In his old age, during the 1870s and 1880s, Zeshin added an unusual new technique to his repertoire. In response to the popularity of oils in the Meiji period, Zeshin began to paint with lacquer on both paper and wooden panels. The naturally dark colors and thick lustrous surface texture of the lacquer—used on this composition for the black and brown bodies of the insects—added to the illusion of Western pigments.