‘Fuji-yama, the sacred mountain, refuge of mysterious legends and of ancient naturalist dreams, rises up in the coolness of blue mornings and in the gold of evening… Japanese art never a more sustained contemplation of a theme; never did its painters approach nature with such solemnity.’(Focillon, 1914 cited in Bouquillard, 2007) As this quote shows Mount Fuji has been taken a significant position to Japanese culture and people’s life. Hokusai’s ‘Dawn at Isawa in Kai Province’ is one of the series of the Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, which is a woodblock prints of merchant culture in Edo Period. ‘Mt. Fuji’ by Kanō Tanʼyū is a six panel folding screen which had practical and decorative functions and often used in samurai culture. This essay …show more content…
1 is one of the series of The Thirty-six View of Mount Fuji by Hokusai Katsushika who is known for woodblock prints artist in Japan. Its size is such as a smaller poster which is convenient to carry with hand. While the number of travelers of ordinary people extremely increased since the country became peaceful and more convenient to travel during the Tokugawa shogunate, production of woodblock prints also extended for products for travelers, for example, illustrated guidebooks and souvenirs for friends or family members. (Guth, 1998: 28-29) Fig. 2 is a six panel folding screen. Folding screens were often used to providing privacy at night and hindering from drafts in the winter, while providing a decoration to a room. When not in use, screens could be easily folded and put away. In addition, placing painted screen behind emphasised the importance of the highest position such as the shogun’s. (Guth, 1998: …show more content…
When Ieyasu Tokugawa, the first shogun, was a child, he was educated by a Buddhist priest at the temple while he was a hostage of the Imagawa family in Suruga. Once started underlife after retiring the shogun, he became a believer of the hef priest of the Kiyomidera Temple at that time and visited there often. In order to the relation with the Tokugawa family, the temple was allowed to have the crest of the Tokugawa family believed by the members of Tokugawa family.(Seiken,
...clouds above refer to traditional Japanese screen paintings and provide a softening side to the water. They create a balance symbolising hope and good luck. Four wind symbols are used as a devise to balance the composition – all are blowing air gently into the picture. The cartoon like face with its puffed out, red cheeks expelling air. All suggest a positive, natural energy.
In 1857 Ando Hiroshige created a woodblock print titled Riverside Bamboo Market, Kyobashi representing a scene in Japan. The print is of a blue river, a bridge, and what looks like a mountain of bamboo. People are shown walking on the bridge as if they are entering the bamboo market. The colors in the artwork give off a calm feeling and the lines draw you into the details of the work. Calling the print Riverside Bamboo Market, Kyobashi, Ando Hiroshige presents the river as a market where people come to gain items to sustain focusing on the abundance of bamboo.
Much of what is considered modern Japan has been fundamentally shaped by its involvement in various wars throughout history. In particular, the events of World War II led to radical changes in Japanese society, both politically and socially. While much focus has been placed on the broad, overarching impacts of war on Japan, it is through careful inspection of literature and art that we can understand war’s impact on the lives of everyday people. The Go Masters, the first collaborative film between China and Japan post-WWII, and “Turtleback Tombs,” a short story by Okinawan author Oshiro Tatsuhiro, both give insight to how war can fundamentally change how a place is perceived, on both an abstract and concrete level.
Japanese art comes in many styles, and I am focusing on a specific kind of artwork that was created during the Muromachi period, and is called Japanese wall scroll art. I will discus the political, and aesthetic motivations for the art as well as the styles the artists used.
“Until the seventeenth century, Japanese Literature was privileged property. …The diffusion of literacy …(and) the printed word… created for the first time in Japan the conditions necessary for that peculiarly modern phenomenon, celebrity” (Robert Lyons Danly, editor of The Narrow Road of the Interior written by Matsuo Basho; found in the Norton Anthology of World Literature, Second Edition, Volume D). Celebrity is a loose term at times; it connotes fortune, flattery, and fleeting fame. The term, in this modern era especially, possesses an aura of inevitable transience and glamorized superficiality. Ironically, Matsuo Basho, (while writing in a period of his own newfound celebrity as a poet) places an obvious emphasis on the transience of life within his travel journal The Narrow Road of the Interior. This journal is wholly the recounting of expedition and ethos spanning a fifteen hundred mile feat, expressed in the form of a poetic memoir. It has been said that Basho’s emphasis on the Transient is directly related to his and much of his culture’s worldview of Zen Buddhism, which is renowned for its acknowledgement of the Transient as a tool for a more accurate picture of life and a higher achievement of enlightenment. Of course, in the realization that Basho does not appear to be unwaveringly religious, perhaps this reflection is not only correlative to Zen Buddhism, but also to his perspective on his newfound celebrity. Either way, Matsuo Basho is a profound lyricist who eloquently seeks to objectify and relay the concept of transience even in his own name.
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...ng materials also linking back to Herzog’s use of wood. This is reflected an interest in the use of Japanese wooden-frame traditions showing the sensitivity and irregularity of the composition.
Munsterberg, H. (1985) The Arts of Japan An Illustrated History Charles E. Tuttle, Tokyo, Japan.
Over the course of Japanese history, arguably, no artist is more famous for their works than Katsushika Hokusai. During his 88 years of life, he produced over 30,000 pieces of artwork, and heavily influenced Western styles of art. His most famous piece was created around 1831, a Japanese styled piece titled, The Great Wave off Kanagawa. This piece has stood as a defining piece of artwork in the Japanese culture for over 180 years, analyzed by students and authors for the interpretations filling the paper. The relationship between Hokusai’s painting has directly affected the Western point of view of Japanese style. The English author, Herbert Read’s novel interprets the painting distinctly differently from a Japanese point, American poet,
Denison. B. (2002, January 1). A Basic Overview of Japanese Culture . . Retrieved May 3, 2014, from http://www.mizukan.org/articles/culture.htm
...better defined image. The linear clarity is made more visibly off-set by the warmth of color that radiates off the mountain top. The woman in prayer, although neatly defined with shadow, has an unclear expression that is reminiscent of the ukiyo-e style. What also reminds this writer of ukiyo-e, is the attention to impermanence in the position of the setting sun.
Yukio Mishima’s Temple of the Golden Pavilion, set in postwar Japan, gives way to a reflection of the postwar experience both the representation of military aggression and in use of symbolism of beauty, loss, and destruction. A story about Mizoguchi, a young, stuttering acolyte’s obsession with beauty lends itself to the conflagration of the Temple of the Golden Pavilion, based loosely on a true story about the Kinkaku-ji.
Ieyasu established his government at Edo, present-day Tokyo, where he had a huge castle. His was a stable, peaceful government beginning a period of Japanese history which was to last until the Imperial Restoration of 1868, for although Ieyasu himself died in 1616 members of his family succeeded each other and the title Shogun became virtually an hereditary one for the Tokugawas.