Black Shōki, the Demon Queller

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Look at the dense black of the hair and beard against the pale paper, the sword held point down, and the scowl under the heavy brows.

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Shōki, called Zhong Kui in China, is a queller of demons. In Japan his image was hung at the Boys’ Day festival, partly to guard against disease, and people trusted both Shōki and the color red to keep illness away, the Art Institute explains. The Met also holds Hokusai’s Red Zhong Kui of 1846. This Shōki, in ink alone, dates from 1849, the year Hokusai died, and its inscription calls him an old man of ninety.

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Hanging scroll; ink on paper · Image: 42 1/4 × 14 3/16 in. (107.3 × 36 cm · The Metropolitan Museum of Art

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Museum title: Black Shōki, the Demon Queller
Artist: Katsushika Hokusai (Japanese, Tokyo (Edo) 1760–1849 Tokyo (Edo))
Date: 1849
Medium: Hanging scroll; ink on paper
Dimensions: Image: 42 1/4 × 14 3/16 in. (107.3 × 36 cm) Overall with mounting: 72 5/8 × 18 1/2 in. (184.5 × 47 cm) Overall with knobs: 72 5/8 × 20 1/2 in. (184.5 × 52 cm)
Credit line: Charles Stewart Smith Collection, Gift of Mrs. Charles Stewart Smith, Charles Stewart Smith Jr., and Howard Caswell Smith, in memory of Charles Stewart Smith, 1914
Image license: CC0 1.0 · Public domain
Museum record: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Artist’s life 1760–1849

Ukiyo-e c. 1600–1900

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Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.

Black Shōki, the Demon Queller

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