Search

Japan

Koetsu grid

The four seasons in the arts of ...

Bank of America, “Pine Trees,” — This pair of six-panel screens beautifully captures the richness of a Japanese landscape.

Hasegawa Tōhaku, Pine Trees

by Bank of America

Koetsu grid — Two folding screens from Edo Japan show a lavish golden garden and 36 poem cards by the famous calligrapher Hon'ami Kōetsu.

Hon’ami Kōetsu, Folding Screen mounted with poems

by Dr. Sonia Coman and Dr. Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank

jomon grid — Skill in pottery has been an important defining aspect of Japanese culture from earliest time

Jōmon pottery

by The British Museum

The origin of the dōtaku is thought to be the Chinese cattle bell.

Dōtaku (ritual bells)

by The British Museum

MM Video 9 Hokusai Seattle video still — “Five Beautiful Women,” by Katsushika Hokusai depicts women of different social backgrounds. Painted on silk, the work prompts the viewer to consider clothing and its relationship to identity. Discover more about Hokusai from Amada Cruz, Illsley Ball Nordstrom Director and CEO of the Seattle Art Museum.

Five Beautiful Women by Katsushika Hokusai

by Bank of America

mincho grid — Monju was a bodhisattva popular among Zen Buddhists, and he is here painted by a Zen monk-painter

Kichizan Minchō, Monju Bosatsu

by Minneapolis Institute of Art

Koto grid — The decorated koto that might be too beautiful to play

Goto Teijo, Koto

by The Metropolitan Museum of Art

grid Fudō Myōō — "He's like the bouncer of Buddhism."

Fudō Myōō (Achala-vidyārāja)

by The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Kabuki theatre's leading actors influenced fashion and taste and quickly became the subject of popular woodblock prints in Japan

Kabuki actor prints

by The British Museum

toyo grid — Sesshu Toyo's painting involves a remarkable economy of brushwork, often called haboku (broken ink) or hatsuboku (flung ink).

Sessō Tōyō, Haboku-style landscape

by The British Museum

oribe grid — When is the imperfect, more perfect? Oribe ware was an early 17th-century revolution in tea ceremony ceramics

Oribe Tea Bowl

by Dr. Sonia Coman and Dr. Steven Zucker

Bamboo in the Four Seasons, attributed to Tosa Mistunobu, late 15th to early 16th century (Muromachi period), Japan, ink, color and gold leaf on paper, each screen 157 x 360 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) — Art coming from contemporaneous Ming-dynasty China as well older Chinese art deeply influenced Japanese arts, especially the emerging local tradition of ink landscape painting.

Nanbokuchō and Muromachi periods, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Mariko Mori, Pure Land, 1996-98 — The Heisei period saw the establishment of new art museums and the adoption of new means of expression among Japanese artists.

Heisei period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Kurokawa Kisho, the Nakagin Capsule Tower, Tokyo, completed 1972, detail of exterior view of prefabricated units (image: City Lab) — The Showa period was one of dynamic changes—and one affected by world wars and challenges at home.

Shōwa period

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Yasuda Auditorium, architect: Uchida Yoshikazu, patron: Yasuda Zenjiro, built 1925, renovated after 1968 (image: Kakidai CC 4.0, Wikimedia Commons) — The Taishō period continued the process of adoption and transformation of foreign models in Japan

Taishō period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Nanri Kajū II, pair of vases, ca. 1875, porcelain with underglaze blue and overglaze enameling and gilding, H. 75.7 cm (Philadelphia Museum of Art) — After over two centuries of shogunal rule, practical political power was restored to the emperor (Meiji)

Meiji period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Edo period — The Edo period saw an intensified circulation of visual vocabulary and aesthetic principles between mediums (paintings, ceramics, lacquerware, and textiles often shared the similar motifs) and crossing different registers of culture from design to popular culture to nostalgia for a romanticized pre-modern past.

Edo period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Fushimi-Momoyama castle, built 1594, rebuilt 1964 (Fushimi Ward, Kyoto, image: Wikimedia Commons) — The Azuchi-Momoyama period gets its name from the opulent residences of two warlords who attempted to unify Japan.

Azuchi-Momoyama period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

Night Attack on the Sanjô Palace (detail), Illustrated Scrolls of the Events of the Heiji Era (Heiji monogatari emaki) Japanese, Kamakura period, second half of the 13th century, 45.9 x 774.5 x 7.6 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) — During the Kamakura period, the confluence or syncretism of Buddhism and the indigenous Shintō deepened.

Kamakura period, an introduction

by Dr. Sonia Coman

over here