Some of Japan’s most captivating art exists in the form of ink-on-paper woodblock prints, as well as paper folding screens and silk hanging scrolls decorated with ink, gold leaf, and mineral pigments. Love of nature and awareness of the changing seasons are longstanding motifs in the literary and visual arts of Japan. The twelve Edo-period woodblock prints, screens, and scrolls reproduced in this calendar are elegantly adorned with the revered crane (tsuru), symbolizing birth, marriage, good fortune, and peace.