Japanese
Sliding Doors (fusamas): Chrysanthemums (recto) and Bamboo (versos), 17th century
Four sliding doors (fusama); mineral pigment and gold leaf on paper , 167 x 93.5 cm (65 3/4 x 36 13/16 in.)
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These Japanese sliding doors with four vertical panels are assembled in a horizontal group. They have narrow frames and small doily-shaped pulls. They are covered with paper to which a gold background has been applied. On the front of the panels are a profusion of green chrysanthemum plants with white flowers. Spread across the bottom of one of the front panels is a dark area with some green edges, which could indicate a body of water and which extends partly into the neighboring panel. On the back of the panels there are many green bamboo plants with delicate fronds. The surface of the panels is somewhat abraded.
Second Floor Passage
Commentary
These sliding doors are painted on both sides and were originally set into two parallel tracks in a Japanese building. The side that Isabella Stewart Gardner chose to display is a scene of chrysanthemums growing on a bank beside a stream. Heavy clouds of mist in gold leaf provide the background for the white of the flowers and the dark green of the leaves. On the other side, slender bamboo in sparse and thick groups stretch along the foreground. There is a graceful rhythm to the thin stalks and the sharp, spritely leaves. Both chrysanthemums and bamboo are recurrent themes in Japanese screen painting. The chrysanthemums on this screen likely appealed to Isabella Stewart Gardner who grew the prize winning autumnal blooms in the greenhouses at Green Hill, her residence in Brookline, Massachusetts.