The 36th Annual Michele and Peter Berton Memorial Lecture: Sipping Tiger and Soaring Dragons

Join us for the 36th annual Michele and Peter Berton Memorial Lecture on Japanese Art presented by Matthew McKelway, PhD, Takeo and Itsuko Atsumi Professor of Japanese Art History, Department of Art History & Archaeology, Columbia University.

Edo-period (1615–1868) paintings of tigers and dragons raise fundamental questions about the operations of painters in Japan before their embrace of Western modernity in the 19th century. Focusing on LACMA’s painting by Kanō Sansetsu (1589–1651), the leader of the Kyoto-based workshop of the Kanō school, this talk will address the question of how artists attempted to depict subject matter or phenomena of foreign or mythical origin that they could not actually see.