ANONYMOUS (19TH CENTURY)
Lotus and Fish
Joseon dynasty (1392-1897), 19th century
The six-panel screen painted in ink and colors on paper, mounted on silvered paper, depicting fish, swallows, and ducks among blossoming lotus
40 1/4 x 79in (102.3 x 200.7cm), continuous image only; 84 x 90 1/2in (213.3 x 230cm) overall
Footnotes:
Provenance
Formerly in a West-Coast private collection, acquired in Korea, 1950s-60s
The screen was later re-mounted in 1970s in the Japanese style.

The fish was a symbolically significant and popular allegory in both Chinese and Korean Art and was the subject of paintings and works of art as early as the Song Dynasty (960-1279 AD). Historically, the fish was cited prominently and frequently as an allegory for 'freedom from restraints' in the famed Daoist book Zhuangzi, written by the influential early philosopher Zhuang Zhou (ca.369- ca. 386 BC), as an important and noble Daoist ideal to strive for in one's lifetime. To the educated, literati observer of Joseon-dynasty Neo-Confucian Korea, such imagery would have clearly and directly evoked this same Daoist ideal.