Bird and Plum Blossoms 18th century

Unpō painted "Bird and Plum Blossoms" on silk with ink and color sometime in the late 18th to mid-19th century. The image evokes a world of aesthetic contemplation, but it also makes use of visual codes. The bird is a magpie, and the blossoms are plum. Together, these make use of a common pun suggesting good fortune. This theme would have resonated strongly in Japan during the Edo period. At this time, artistic patronage was closely tied to social class. This work is not signed with a family name, suggesting the artist was not of the aristocratic class. He would have likely been a member of the merchant class. The image might be read as a subtle commentary on upward mobility and the rising fortunes of merchants in a society still dominated by traditional hierarchies. To understand it better, we can look to records of artistic patronage from the time, as well as the biographies of artists and the history of artistic institutions like the Kano school.