Textile Fragments | Cleveland Museum of Art

These fragments are rare survivors of catastrophic rains that destroyed much of the Moche textile legacy and may have helped to bring about the decline of Moche culture. Each depicts a serpent and a snail beneath a hovering raptorial bird—perhaps a snail kite, a type of hawk named after its favored food. The size of the motifs implies that the original textile was large; a mantle (a shawl-like garment) or a hanging are among the possibilities.

Spring Mist over Jiangnan | Cleveland Museum of Art

Bottle Cooler | Cleveland Museum of Art

The form of these cachepots is entirely typical of Saint-Cloud porcelain of about 1725. Their decoration, based upon Chinese porcelains of the so-called "famille-verte" type, is most unusual. Polychromed enamels were not often employed on Saint-Cloud porcelains, and figural scenes are very rare.

Echtpaar met kinderen in de regen, Honoré Daumier, 1839 - Rijksmuseum

Fabrieksmeisjes in een regenbui, Alexander Ver Huell, ca. 1854 - ca. 1887 - Rijksmuseum

Landscape | Cleveland Museum of Art

This composition includes imagery from the Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers. Scanning the composition from top to bottom, at least six of the views are discernible: night rain over Xiao and Xiang, evening bell from a mist-shrouded temple, returning sails off a distant shore, geese descending to a sandbar, mountain village in clearing mist, and sunset glow over a fishing village. Inside the painting’s box is a document with a long inscription by prominent calligrapher, collector, and connoisseur Maeda Kōsetsu (1841–1916) discussing the painting’s subject and the matter of the painter’s biography—he appears to have been a Kano school artist, but his precise identity is unclear.

Figure Mooring a Boat | Cleveland Museum of Art

Kannan is a little-known painter of the Kanto region. Close inspection of this quiet scene suggests that it represents the “night rain over Xiao and Xiang” scene from the Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers. The style of the painting is similar to some works from Korea; as Japanese and Korean monk-painters traveled back and forth between one another’s monastic communities during the 1400s and 1500s, Kannan surely had the opportunity to consider incorporating Korean stylistic features into his work.

Rain | Cleveland Museum of Art

Buiig weer, Frederika Henriëtte Broeksmit, 1885 - 1931 - Rijksmuseum

Branch Hill Pond, Hampstead | Cleveland Museum of Art

<br>An amateur meteorologist, John Constable was most at home painting meticulously observed cloud formations, weather conditions, and natural light effects. He believed an accurate rendering of these constantly shifting elements could convey his vision of the vitality and magnificence of the English countryside. Working from the summerhouse he rented at Hampstead from 1819–26, Constable painted a landscape focusing more on the dark rain clouds than on the laborers in the foreground, keeping the details of their backbreaking work at a picturesque distance.