Former AGA President Allan Abramson spotted games of go in two scenes currently on display in the East wing of the National Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Horses and Grooms in the Stable
Muromachi period, early 1500s
pair of six-panel screens; ink, color, and gold on paper
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Edward L. Whittemore Fund
“Fine horses were treasured assets for military commanders, who built elaborate stables to house them. A Portuguese priest who visited Japan during the Edo period noted that such stables were spotlessly clean, elaborate structures where members of the elite could entertain, as shown here. Guests sit on tatami mats and play the board games go or shogi (similar to chess) while falconers watch over their hawks and grooms attend to the spirited horses. Monkeys, thought to draw illness away from horses, appear in the panels to the right of the go or shogi players.”
The Cleveland Museum of Art has a high-res version of the entire scene.
Warrior Minamoto Raiko and the Earth Spider
Utagawa Kuniyoshi
1798 – 1861
Edo period, 1843
triptych, woodblock print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art,
The Joan Elizabeth Tanney Bequest
The Earth or Dirt Spider
“Families that rebelled against the emperor were disparaged as ‘dirt spiders’ (tsuchigumo) in some ancient Japanese texts. In the popular imagination, the term was taken literally to refer to a giant, ground-dwelling arachnid. In Kuniyoshi’s print, the Earth Spider tries to ensnare in its web a famous but ailing warrior, Minamoto Raiko (948 – 1021), whose four bodyguards sip sake and play board games. The artist used the story to satirize the harshness of the government in his own day. When the print was issued in 1843, viewers understood that the sick Raiko was a stand-in for the unpopular current shogun, and the horde of demons symbolized the down-trodden townspeople.
“In Yoshitsuya’s version of the story, Raiko’s bodyguards or generals lower themselves in baskets into the cave of the Earth Spider and its serpent companion. The monster glares at the intruders with its green, bulging eyes, while countless small spiders crawl over its body. Despite the odds against them, the bodyguards ultimately slay the Earth Spider. Their victory inspired a centuries-old Noh play, Tsuchigumo, that was adapted for Kabuki theater.”
The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston has a high-quality version of the triptych here.
-edited by Nate Eagle
