Plums, Bamboo, and Orchid (1834): Art, History and Details

Plums, Bamboo, and Orchid (1834) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Yamamoto Baiitsu (Japanese, 1783–1856).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This painting represents three of the plants known as the Four Gentlemen of Chinese painting; it lacks only autumn’s chrysanthemum. The plants’ characteristics are symbols of Confucian virtues, such as open-mindedness (bamboo), strength in the face of adversity (plum), and humility (orchid).

Object facts

• Title: Plums, Bamboo, and Orchid
• Date: 1834
• Creator attribution: Yamamoto Baiitsu (Japanese, 1783–1856)
• Culture: Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)
• Type: Painting
• Technique: hanging scroll; ink on silk
• Dimensions: Painting only: 172.4 x 79 cm (67 7/8 x 31 1/8 in.); Including mounting: 252.7 x 105.4 cm (99 1/2 x 41 1/2 in.)
• Collection: ASIAN - Hanging scroll
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 1975.93

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1975.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 63, no. 2 (February 1976): 31–71. Published as: White Prunus
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.
• Graham, Patricia J. "Lifestyles of Scholar-Painters in Edo Japan." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 77, no. 7 (September 1990): 262–283.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.