Water landscape

The overwhelming power of a swift current surges across this pair of oversized screens as blue-green water tumbles over rocks, then picks up speed to flow restlessly from left to right. The screens’ zigzag folds contribute to the illusion of a shallow, three-dimensional stream bed. Seated beside them on the floor of a traditional tatami mat-lined room, viewers might easily imagine the sound of the stream, the dampness of its mossy banks, and the cool air rising from the water’s surface.

Okochi Yako was trained in literati painting, a mode practiced in Japan since the 1700s. He studied the work of such earlier masters as Uragami Gyokudo (1745–1820) whose ink landscape is shown in this gallery, but his use of color and robust brushwork were inspired by Tomioka Tessai (1836–1924), the most famous literati painter of Okochi’s formative years.