shiki kachō-zu 四季花鳥図

Paintings of birds and flowers representative of each of the four seasons. Most often these comprise a set of screens on which birds and flowers are placed in a landscape setting progressing seasonally across the screens from right to left or sometimes vice versa. Sesshū 雪舟 (1420-1506) produced several early examples of the genre including a pair of folding screens in the Maeda Ikutokukai 前田育徳会 collection, Tokyo. Bird-and-flower paintings further developed during the Momoyama period, when brilliant colors and lavish gold were used to embellish the sliding screens and walls of castle residences.