Gakuryo Nakamura - Song of the Cicada (蝉吟)

Song of the Cicada (Semigin) is an ink-and-color hanging scroll on silk by Nakamura Gakuryo (1890-1969), a celebrated Nihonga master and a recipient of Japan's Order of Culture (1962). A single green cicada clings to the smooth bark of a slender tree, set against the rhythm of three vertical trunks rendered on fine silk. Gakuryo, who in his youth absorbed the elegant traditions of the Rinpa school under Nozawa Teiu and the Yamato-e Tosa school under Kawabe Mitate, was equally devoted to direct observation, and the gossamer wings and softly mottled bark in this composition reveal his celebrated draftsmanship. In East Asian poetry the cicada has long stood as an emblem of summer, transience and renewal, and the work conveys that sentiment with quiet, contemplative restraint. The painting is signed Gakuryo at the lower left with the artist's red intaglio seal. It is preserved in its original double wooden storage box: the inner artist-signed box bears the title Semigin on the lid in the artist's own brushwork and his signature with red seal on the inside of the lid, accompanied by the original mounter's label of the respected Nakamura Shindo workshop on the outer box.

Artist: Gakuryo Nakamura (Japan, 1890-1969)

Year: 1890-1969

Medium: Painting

Materials: Ink and color on silk

Classification: Unique

Size: Not specified (hearing sheet file not provided)

Signature: Hand-signed Gakuryo with red intaglio seal at lower-left of painting. Inner artist box bears title Semigin and signature with red seal.