ANONYMOUS (16TH CENTURY)

The subject of this rare painting, recently discovered in a Japanese collection, is a gathering of six officials in an idyllic setting on a bluff overlooking a lake or a large river. The painting is in the style of An Gyeon (active ca. 1440-70), but differs from others of the period in that it has fewer landscape elements. One painting attributed to An Gyeon School in the collection of the National Museum of Korea, Seoul, that represents gathering of officials at the Board of Defense, is visually similar to this one, and the date of 1541 indicate that such gatherings and associated paintings were well established by the first half of the sixteenth century (accession number, Sinsu 13555) (fig. 1). The title and list of attendees might have been cropped.