Dragon and Tiger
Sesson Shukei
1546–1556
- Medium
- Pair of six-panel folding screens; ink on paper
- Dimensions
- Each: 157.3 x 339 cm (61 15/16 x 133 7/16 in.); Framed: 172.3 x 354 cm (67 13/16 x 139 3/8 in.)
- Genre
- Paintings
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art
Styles
Tags
Japan, Muromachi period (1392–1573) to Momoyama period (1573–1615)
About
A tiger sits in a bamboo grove whipped with fierce wind, while a dragon claws through clouds above rough waves. Tiger and dragon are Chinese cosmological symbols of the balancing forces in the world, yin (the feminine aspect) and yang (the masculine aspect). The tiger's roar is also said to generate wind, and the dragon clouds. The screens may have originally been meant to express the fluctuating nature of the world as envisioned in the practice of military divination, or forecasting, based on the Yijing (Book of Changes).
