NEW ORLEANS.- During the Edo period (1615-1868), Japan was free from major domestic and international conflict. The relative political, social and economic stability combined with growth in cities and domestic trade, gave rise to unprecedented opportunities for artistic activity. In the growing cities and towns artists worked to decorate newly constructed buildings and homes for their patrons, from both the traditional elite classes as well as the increasingly wealthy merchant class.

These art patrons had money, knowledge and leisure. Their leisure-time activities—reading, enjoying nature, drinking with friends, frequenting the pleasure districts—became popular subjects for painters during the mid- to late-Edo period. Paintings of this subject by artists working in a variety of traditions are presented in IDLE PURSUITS: Celebrations of Leisure in the Asian Gallery at the New Orleans Museum of Art until January 4, 2005.

In Landscape with Tea House, painted in 1860 by Fujimoto Tesseki (1817-1863), a man can be seen preparing tea inside a rustic tea hut. Tesseki, a nanga painter, used this Chinese-influenced style to portray a gentleman at ease. Far removed from the cares of everyday life, he enjoys the simple pleasure of boiling water and making tea, which he will sip while gazing out the window at the lush landscape that surrounds him. The viewer, both of Tesseki's time and our own, vicariously experiences the refreshing tranquillity of the scene.

The pleasures depicted were often of a more worldly nature. Ukiyo-e painters and printmakers took as their subject the exuberant and hedonistic world of brothels and theaters in the major cities of Japan during the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries. Teisai Hokuba (1771-1844), whose work Women Gathering Clams and Crabs at the Seashore is in the current installation, painted elaborately attired geisha in natural settings. The idealized images of beautiful, happy women offered sensual, emotional and intellectual escape for viewers, who could exchange their everyday worries for the realm of pleasure. The 25 paintings in Idle Pursuits are drawn from the Museum's permanent collection.