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Hello Asian art fanatics. I noticed there are several Japanese art experts her so I figured I would try my luck with this inscription/seal that is found on a small screen I own. Anybody know what it says? Any help would be appreciated.

Many Thanks,

Trang Nguyen

Hi, my visceral reaction is that this is Chinese. The righthand column of characters reads downward as 'Sketched during the eighth lunar month of autumn in the geng chen year' (geng chen qiu ba yue xie). Geng chen occurred in the past couple of centuries in 1820, 1880, 1940 and the year 2000. The bold characters on the left comprise the name Mu Zhongdian. I'm not certain of what the red seal says but it doesn't appear to be the same name.

Best regards,

Bill H.

Thanks for your insight Bill H. This is all interesting information. Whats unusual is that this is an Edo period screen (complete with gold foil background) that depicts a Geisha. Were some of the artists that worked in this style Chinese?

My gut judgment, in the absence of any other visual clues, was influenced by my subjective opinion that Chinese artists tend to use cyclical dates alone with greater frequency than Japanese, who seem prone to use or at least add the name of the reign period.

Having seen the 'geisha' I'm still a bit ambivalent as to whether the painter was Chinese or Japanese because the Japanese traditional concept of feminine 'beauty' (bijin) seems to me to incorporate some Tang dynasty and earlier Chinese esthetic concepts, including some clothing and hairstyles.

I've seen Quite a lot of Chinese porcelain that emulated Japanese styles so wouldn't want to rule out that Chinese graphic artists didn't have roving eyes when it came to their models. In any event, I pitched in here to lend some language expertise and defer to others who know traditional Japanese art better than I.

Best regards,

Bill H.

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