Like Louis Comfort Tiffany, John La Farge was a painter, stained glass artist, muralist, and interior designer based in New York. This painting was completed in 1886, the year the artist visited Japan with his friend, historian Henry Adams. The loosely handled brush work combines a sense of the exotic and a somber tone. The artist published a book in 1897 titled, An Artist’s Letters from Japan, one of eight books and numerous essays La Farge wrote over the course of his career.
