Second Nature: Japanese Rinpa Paintings from the Gitter-Yelen Collection offers an immersive look at the influential Rinpa tradition in Japanese art, featuring nearly 60 hanging scrolls, folding screens, fan paintings, and handscrolls drawn from the collection of Alice Yelen Gitter and the late Dr. Kurt A. Gitter, as well as selections from NOMA’s collection.

One of the most distinctive schools of Japan’s Edo period (1615–1868), Rinpa artists combined specialized ink painting techniques with a shimmering, polychrome palette in compositions to create scenes from nature. By using iconic signifiers of particular seasons as their subject matter, Rinpa artists participated in the creation of Japan’s “second nature”: a symbolic herbarium that evoked the flow of time and the range of human feeling. As a form of collective cultural memory, Japan’s second nature formed a set of motifs central to the Rinpa repertoire.  

Second Nature positions Sakai Hōitsu (1757–1828) as a pivotal figure and “founder” of Rinpa, as it was his late 18th-century rediscovery and revival of the artistic achievements of Ogata Kōrin (1658–1716) from nearly a century earlier that formed the foundation of this style. Kōrin excelled at ink painting and also introduced new approaches to the painting medium from other craft traditions, such as textiles and lacquer. The result was an inter-media approach that combined picture and pattern in stylized, abstract ways that showcased the colors and materiality of the artwork. 

Second Nature offers new insights and perspectives into one of the most distinctive schools of painting from the Edo period. The exhibition includes a selection of important works by Kōrin, Hon’ami Kōetsu (1558-1637), Tawaraya Sōtatsu (ca. 1600-1640), and others who, due to Hōitsu’s scholarship, are now regarded as the originators of Rinpa painting. The exhibition is distinguished by its focus on later Rinpa painters such as Hōitsu, Nakamura Hōchū (d. 1819), Suzuki Kiitsu (1796-1858), and the 20th-century master Kamisakka Sekka (1866-1942).

About the Collectors

Second Nature reflects the longtime support of the late Dr. Kurt A. Gitter and Alice Yelen Gitter, who have had a remarkable five-decade long relationship with NOMA while making important contributions to the understanding of Rinpa and its impact in the modern world. Over the years, the Gitters have donated nearly 350 works of art to NOMA and facilitated the donations of scores of other gifts from friends, family, and colleagues. Their sustained philanthropy has formed the foundation of the Japanese art collection at NOMA. An installation on the growth of the Japanese collection will be presented in the Kurt A. Gitter, M.D. and Alice Yelen Gitter Gallery for Japanese Art on NOMA’s third floor this fall, coinciding with Second Nature.

Second Nature: Japanese Rinpa Paintings from the Gitter-Yelen Collection is organized by NOMA and curated by Yukio Lippit, Professor of the History of Japanese Art at Harvard University. The exhibition is sponsored by the Blakemore Foundation. Additional support is provided by Harvey and Marie Orth.