Pleasures at Itsukushima Shrine,

17th–18th century

This screen depicts a bird’s-eye view of a festival at the Itsukushima Shrine, located on the island of Miyajima in the Inland Sea. The right panels show a town filled with open-fronted stores displaying an array of wares and pedestrians strolling along broad thoroughfares. On the left half of the screen is the shrine, an elaborate complex with a dock and temple halls in front, a pagoda, and more private quarters in back. The buildings extend over the water, and pilgrims were only permitted to approach by boat (as seen in the middle of the screen), passing the shrine’s most famous site, a large red torii gate that appears to float on the water. The gate, a Shinto symbol for the transition between secular and sacred realms, is visible in the third panel from the right. Clouds formed of gold leaf swirl along the top and bottom of the screen, framing the scene. Breaks in the clouds reveal hints of a distant landscape beyond. Most likely, this screen originally was paired with one showing the Sumiyoshi Shrine, a Shinto complex in Osaka.