Sericulture (The Process of Making Silk)
early 1200s
Medium
Handscroll; ink and color on silk
Dimensions
third section: 27.6 × 92.3 cm · second section: 27.6 × 92.3 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Chinese Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
John L. Severance Collection
Accession Number
1977.5
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
About this artwork
By the Southern Song period, the economic center of the silk industry had shifted to the lower Yangzi delta, while the north continued to be troubled by wars. Divided into three sections, the handscroll illustrates 14 steps in the process of making silk. The scroll’s scenes follow the illustrations of Lou Shou’s (1090–1162) Pictures of Tilling and Weaving (gengzhi tu), the first recorded painting of this genre, which was conceived in Hangzhou around 1145. However, in the Cleveland painting the a...