Framed by the blossoms of a viburnum, this magpie is depicted with great attention to detail, reflecting a taste for the idealized naturalism characteristic of the imperial painting academy of China’s Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279). Chinese paintings, treasured by Ashikaga shoguns of the fifteenth century, exerted a strong influence on Japanese artists of the Muromachi period, when Chinese culture also served as a model for the Zen priesthood and educated elite. Little is known about the artist, but a good number of academic-style bird-and-flower paintings feature his seal or have been attributed to his hand.