This beguiling scene of a girl lulled by the sound of a softly boiling tea cauldron, set on a portable hearth of the type used during the summer, is one of Harunobu’s Eight Parlor Views (Zashiki hakkei). It playfully alludes to “Night Rain,” one of the Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers in China, a venerable theme in both Chinese and Japanese painting. Here the summer mood intrinsic to that landscape is transposed to the interior of an Edo (Tokyo) house of pleasure. Harunobu’s work is distinctive for its subtle tonality, achieved by mixing pigments rather than by superimposing two printed colors.

Artist: 鈴木春信 Suzuki Harunobu (Japanese, 1725–1770)