Modern Japanese Art and the Meiji State

Modern Japanese Art and the Meiji State PDF

Author: Dōshin Satō

Publisher: Getty Publications

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 378

ISBN-13: 1606060597

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

This is an insightful and intelligent re-thinking of Japanese art history & its Western influences. This broad-ranging and profoundly influential analysis describes how Western art institutions and vocabulary were transplanted to Japan in the late nineteenth century. In the 1870-80s, artists and government administrators in Japan encountered the Western 'system of the arts' for the first time. Under pressure to exhibit and sell its artistic products abroad, Japan's new Meiji government came face-to-face with the need to create European-style art schools and museums - and even to establish Japanese words for art, painting, artist, and sculpture. "Modern Japanese Art" is a full re-conceptualization of the field of Japanese art history, exposing the politics through which the words, categories, and values that structure our understanding of the field came to be while revealing the historicity of Western and non-Western art history.

Challenging Past And Present

Challenging Past And Present PDF

Author: Ellen P. Conant

Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

Published: 2006-01-01

Total Pages: 346

ISBN-13: 9780824829377

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

The complex and coherent development of Japanese art during thecourse of the nineteenth century was inadvertently disrupted by apolitical event: the Meiji Restoration of 1868. Scholars of both thepreceding Edo (1615-1868) and the succeeding Meiji (1868-1912) erashave shunned the decades bordering this arbitrary divide, thus creatingan art-historical void that the former view as a period of waningtechnical and creative inventiveness and the latter as one threatenedby Meiji reforms and indiscriminate westernization and modernization.Challenging Past and Present, to the contrary, demonstrates that theperiod 1840-1890, as seen progressively rather than retrospectively, experienced a dramatic transformation in the visual arts, which in turnmade possible the creative achievements of the twentieth century

Since Meiji

Since Meiji PDF

Author: J. Thomas Rimer

Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

Published: 2011-10-31

Total Pages: 554

ISBN-13: 0824861027

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Research outside Japan on the history and significance of the Japanese visual arts since the beginning of the Meiji period (1868) has been, with the exception of writings on modern and contemporary woodblock prints, a relatively unexplored area of inquiry. In recent years, however, the subject has begun to attract wide interest. As is evident from this volume, this period of roughly a century and a half produced an outpouring of art created in a bewildering number of genres and spanning a wide range of aims and accomplishments. Since Meiji is the first sustained effort in English to discuss in any depth a time when Japan, eager to join in the larger cultural developments in Europe and the U.S., went through a visual revolution. Indeed, this study of the visual arts of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries suggests a fresh history of modern Japanese culture—one that until now has not been widely visible or thoroughly analyzed outside that country. In this extensive collection, which includes some 190 black-and-white and color reproductions, scholars from Japan, Europe, Australia, and America explore an impressive array of subjects: painting, sculpture, prints, fashion design, crafts, and gardens. The works discussed range from early Meiji attempts to create art that referenced Western styles to postwar and contemporary avant-garde experiments. There are, in addition, substantive investigations of the cultural and intellectual background that helped stimulate the creation of new and shifting art forms, including essays on the invention of a modern artistic vocabulary in the Japanese language and the history of art criticism in Japan, as well as an extensive account of the career and significance of perhaps the best-known Japanese figure concerned with the visual arts of his period, Okakura Tenshin (1862–1913), whose Book of Tea is still widely read today. Taken together, the essays in this volume allow readers to connect ideas and images, thus bringing to light larger trends in the Japanese visual arts that have made possible the vitality, range, and striking achievements created during this turbulent and lively period. Contributors: Stephen Addiss, Chiaki Ajioka, John Clark, Ellen Conant, Mikiko Hirayama, Michael Marra, Jonathan Reynolds, J. Thomas Rimer, Audrey Yoshiko Seo, Eric C. Shiner, Lawrence Smith, Shuji Tanaka, Reiko Tomii, Mayu Tsuruya, Toshio Watanabe, Gennifer Weisenfeld, Bert Winther-Tamaki, Emiko Yamanashi.

Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting

Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting PDF

Author: Chelsea Foxwell

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2015-07-20

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 022611080X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Introduction. Nihonga and the historical inscription of the modern -- Exhibitions and the making of modern Japanese painting -- In search of images -- The painter and his audiences -- Decadence and the emergence of Nihonga style -- Naturalizing the double reading -- Transmission and the historicity of Nihonga -- Conclusion.

The Visual Culture of Meiji Japan

The Visual Culture of Meiji Japan PDF

Author: Ayelet Zohar

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-11-29

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1000477479

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

This volume examines the visual culture of Japan’s transition to modernity, from 1868 to the first decades of the twentieth century. Through this important moment in Japanese history, contributors reflect on Japan’s transcultural artistic imagination vis-a-vis the discernment, negotiation, assimilation, and assemblage of diverse aesthetic concepts and visual pursuits. The collected chapters show how new cultural notions were partially modified and integrated to become the artistic methods of modern Japan, based on the hybridization of major ideologies, visualities, technologies, productions, formulations, and modes of representation. The book presents case studies of creative transformation demonstrating how new concepts and methods were perceived and altered to match views and theories prevalent in Meiji Japan, and by what means different practitioners negotiated between their existing skills and the knowledge generated from incoming ideas to create innovative modes of practice and representation that reflected the specificity of modern Japanese artistic circumstances. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, Japanese studies, Asian studies, and Japanese history, as well as those who use approaches and methods related to globalization, cross-cultural studies, transcultural exchange, and interdisciplinary studies.

The Imperial Museums of Meiji Japan

The Imperial Museums of Meiji Japan PDF

Author: Alice Yu-Ting Tseng

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

It was not until Japan's opening to the West during the Meiji period (1868-1912) that terms for "art" (bijutsu) and "art museum" (bijutsukan) were coined. The Imperial Museums of Meiji Japan documents Japan's unification of national art and cultural resources to forge a modern identity influenced by European museum and exhibition culture. Japan's Imperial Museums were conceived of as national self-representations, and their creation epitomized the Meiji bureaucracy's mission to engage in the international standards and practices of the late nineteenth century. The architecture of the museums, by incorporating Western design elements and construction methods, effectively safeguarded and set off the nation's unique art historical lineage. Western paradigms and expertise, coupled with Japanese resolve and ingenuity, steered the course of the museums' development. Expeditions by high-ranking Japanese officials to Europe and the United States to explore the burgeoning world of art preservation and exhibition, and throughout Japan to inventory important cultural treasures, led to the establishment of the Imperial Museums in the successive imperial cities of Nara, Kyoto, and Tokyo. Over the course of nearly four decades, the English architect Josiah Conder, known as "the father of modern Japanese architecture," and his student Katayama Tokuma, who became the preeminent state architect, designed four main museum buildings to house the national art collection. These buildings articulated the museums' unified mission to preserve and showcase a millennium-long chronology of Japanese art, while reinforcing the distinctive historical and cultural character of their respective cities. This book is the first English-language study of the art, history, and architecture of Japan's Imperial Museums, the predecessors of today's national museums in Tokyo, Kyoto, and Nara. The Imperial Museums of Meiji Japan examines the museums' formative period and highlights cross-cultural influences that enriched and complicated Japan's search for a modern yet historically grounded identity.

Aesthetic Life

Aesthetic Life PDF

Author: Miya Elise Mizuta Lippit

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2020-10-26

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1684175755

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

"This study of modern Japan engages the fields of art history, literature, and cultural studies, seeking to understand how the “beautiful woman” (bijin) emerged as a symbol of Japanese culture during the Meiji period (1868–1912). With origins in the formative period of modern Japanese art and aesthetics, the figure of the bijin appeared across a broad range of visual and textual media: photographs, illustrations, prints, and literary works, as well as fictional, critical, and journalistic writing. It eventually constituted a genre of painting called bijinga (paintings of beauties).Aesthetic Life examines the contributions of writers, artists, scholars, critics, journalists, and politicians to the discussion of the bijin and to the production of a national discourse on standards of Japanese beauty and art. As Japan worked to establish its place in the world, it actively presented itself as an artistic nation based on these ideals of feminine beauty. The book explores this exemplary figure for modern Japanese aesthetics and analyzes how the deceptively ordinary image of the beautiful Japanese woman—an iconic image that persists to this day—was cultivated as a “national treasure,” synonymous with Japanese culture."

Meiji Modern

Meiji Modern PDF

Author: Chelsea Foxwell

Publisher: Japanese Art Society of America

Published: 2023-09-26

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780300263572

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Charting Japan's unique engagement with modernity during the Meiji era, through an extraordinary selection of objects in American collections This exhibition catalogue takes a fresh look at the art of Japan's Meiji era (1868-1912), through a vivid selection of approximately 175 objects drawn from early public and private collections across the United States, including newly discovered prints, photographs, textiles, paintings, and craft objects. Featuring motifs such as the sea and nature, Buddhist deities, contemporary life, and mythical animals, Meiji Modern highlights these themes and their transformation with the introduction of newly imported techniques and materials at the intersection of art, industry, and society. The Meiji era was a complex period of unprecedented cultural and technological transition that played out in the context of intense global competition. The objects assembled in this stunning catalogue also document the history of American collections of nineteenth-century Japanese art. Highlighting the active role of art in the construction of the Japanese nation-state, the works in a variety of mediums capture the hopes and aspirations of Japanese modernization along with its challenges. Building upon this perspective, essays emphasize modern Japanese artists' engagement with both European and Asian trends. With its focus on Japan's often overlooked non-Western modernity, this publication also addresses the role of art in both constructing and reflecting identity. Distributed for the Japanese Art Society of America Exhibition Schedule Asia Society, New York (October 3, 2023-January 7, 2024) Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago (March 21-June 9, 2024) Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (June 30-September 15, 2024)

Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting

Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting PDF

Author: Chelsea Foxwell

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2015-07-20

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 022619597X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

The Western discovery of Japanese paintings at nineteenth-century world’s fairs and export shops catapulted Japanese art to new levels of international popularity. With that popularity, however, came criticism, as Western writers began to lament a perceived end to pure Japanese art and a rise in westernized cultural hybrids. The Japanese response: nihonga, a traditional style of painting that reframed existing techniques to distinguish them from Western artistic conventions. Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting explores the visual characteristics and social functions of nihonga and traces its relationship to the past, its viewers, and emerging notions of the modern Japanese state. Chelsea Foxwell sheds light on interlinked trends in Japanese nationalist discourse, government art policy, American and European commentary on Japanese art, and the demands of export. The seminal artist Kano Hogai (1828–88) is one telling example: originally a painter for the shogun, his art eventually evolved into novel, eerie images meant to satisfy both Japanese and Western audiences. Rather than simply absorbing Western approaches, nihonga as practiced by Hogai and others broke with pre-Meiji painting even as it worked to neutralize the rupture. By arguing that fundamental changes to audience expectations led to the emergence of nihonga—a traditional interpretation of Japanese art for a contemporary, international market—Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting offers a fresh look at an important aspect of Japan’s development into a modern nation.