Kendall H. Brown

Sharon Minichiello

The Taisho period, loosely the first three decades of the 20th century, produced an infatuation with Western modernism as well as a new exploration of traditional aesthetics. Taisho Chic explores the nexus of tradition and modernity manifest in images of women, as well as furnishings and fashions made for women.

Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia, and Deco

Taishō Chic

Carolyn M. Putney

Shūko Koyama

Paul Binnie

"In 1930 the Toledo Museum of Art organized a landmark exhibition of "modern Japanese prints." Featuring the work of ten artists, including Hashiguchi Goyō, Kawase Hasui, and Hiroshi Yoshida, it has stood as a watershed in the success of the shin hanga ("new prints") movement that revived traditional Japanese woodblock prints for a new era. The exhibition's small, limited-edition catalogue (now long since out of print), with its invaluable descriptions and thumbnail black-and-white images, has likewise been considered a shin hanga "bible" for scholars and collectors. Fresh Impressions: Early Modern Japanese Prints, published to complement the exhibition of the same title at the Toledo Museum of Art (October 4, 2013--January 1, 2014), reproduces and re-examines all 343 prints from the original 1930 exhibition catalogue. It features retranslated and updated information about each print and essays by four distinguished authors who explore the context and importance of the 1930 Toledo exhibition, the key players who brought it about, and shin hanga's continuing legacy"--Publisher's website.

Early Modern Japanese Prints

Fresh Impressions

Heroes, villains, and damsels in distress abound in these richly colored, dramatic images from the Japanese equivalent of dime-store novels. These illustrations were selected from woodblock-printed covers and frontispiece illustrations from 64 popular books published in Osaka from 1898 through 1903. They include samurai and strong men, demons and detectives, courtesans, sumo wrestlers, and other vivid characters in scenarios ranging from romantic to grotesquely violent. Printed in the color woodblock method in use since the late eighteenth century, they provide a link between an ancient storytelling tradition and the beginning of mass-published popular literature. Created during the Meiji era (1868–1912), when Japanese society was changing dramatically with the influx of Western technology and values, these images appealed to a wide audience of newly literate readers. Their scenes of retribution and sacrifice reflect a modern consciousness of Japanese history and a longing for an idealized vision of the past, marked by traditional values of loyalty, filial piety, self-sacrifice, and chivalry. Long considered a disposable form of popular culture, these books were not carefully preserved or collected. This collection, assembled by an expert on Japanese art, offers a rare glimpse of a newly rediscovered art form.

Woodblocks from Adventure Stories

Japanese Warriors, Rogues and Beauties

Tim Benton

Takanami Machiko

Catalog of an exhibition held at the Japan Society Gallery, New York, N.Y., Mar. 16-June 17, 2012, the John and Mable Ringing Museum, Sarasota, Fla., July 14- Sept. 30, 2012, and the Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, Fla., Nov. 9-Jan. 19, 2014.

Shaping Art & Culture, 1920-1945

Deco Japan

*Gold Medal winner in the 2014 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for Home & Garden* "Just flipping through the pages of Quiet Beauty: The Japanese Gardens of North America will instantly lower your blood pressure."—The New York Times Book Review Quiet Beauty: Japanese Gardens of North America is an extraordinary look at the most beautiful and serene gardens of the United States and Canada. Most Japanese garden books look to the gardens of Japan. Quiet Beauty explores the treasure trove of Japanese gardens located in North America. Featuring an intimate look at twenty-six gardens, with numerous stunning color photographs of each, that detail their style, history, and special functions, this book explores the ingenuity and range of Japanese landscaping. Japanese gardens have been part of North American culture for almost 150 years. Quiet Beauty is a thought provoking look at the history of their introduction to the world of North American gardening and how this aspect of Japanese culture has taken root and flourished. Japanese gardens include: Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California Nitobe Memorial Garden, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia Japanese Garden, Fort Worth Botanic Garden, Texas Garden of the Pine Winds, Denver Botanic Gardena, Colorado Japanese Garden, Montreal Botanical Garden, Quebec Tenshin'en (The Garden of the Heart of Heaven), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts Roji'en (Garden of Drops of Dew), The George D. and Harriet W. Cornell Japanese Gardens, The Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens, Delray Beach, Florida Japanese Friendship Garden of Phoenix, Margaret T. Hance Park, Arizona Garden of the Pine Wind, Garvan Woodland Garden, Hot Springs, Arkansas

The Japanese Gardens of North America

Quiet Beauty

*Gold Medal winner in the 2014 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for Home & Garden* "Just flipping through the pages of Quiet Beauty: The Japanese Gardens of North America will instantly lower your blood pressure."—The New York Times Book Review Quiet Beauty: Japanese Gardens of North America is an extraordinary look at the most beautiful and serene gardens of the United States and Canada. Most Japanese garden books look to the gardens of Japan. Quiet Beauty explores the treasure trove of Japanese gardens located in North America. Featuring an intimate look at twenty-six gardens, with numerous stunning color photographs of each, that detail their style, history, and special functions, this book explores the ingenuity and range of Japanese landscaping. Japanese gardens have been part of North American culture for almost 150 years. Quiet Beauty is a thought-provoking look at the history of their introduction to the world of North American gardening and how this aspect of Japanese culture has taken root and flourished. Japanese gardens include: Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California Nitobe Memorial Garden, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia Japanese Garden, Fort Worth Botanic Garden, Texas Garden of the Pine Winds, Denver Botanic Gardena, Colorado Japanese Garden, Montreal Botanical Garden, Quebec Tenshin'en (The Garden of the Heart of Heaven), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts Roji'en (Garden of Drops of Dew), The George D. and Harriet W. Cornell Japanese Gardens, The Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens, Delray Beach, Florida Japanese Friendship Garden of Phoenix, Margaret T. Hance Park, Arizona Garden of the Pine Wind, Garvan Woodland Garden, Hot Springs, Arkansas

Minneapolis Institute of Arts

Matthew Welch

Laura W. Allen

Eugene M. Skibbe

Yasunaga Koichi

This major exhibition presents over 160 oil paintings, watercolors and woodblock prints by eight artists from a single family spanning four generations and over 100 years. Featured artists include Kasaburo Yoshida, Hiroshi Yoshida, Toshi Yoshida, Hodaka Yoshida, and the Yoshida women: Fujio, Chizuko, Kiso, and Ayomi, with approximately 20 oil paintings, 15 watercolors, and 100 woodblock prints, several sketchbooks, and other supporting photographs. These fine works are drawn from both public and private collections, most notably The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Toledo Museum of Art, Margaret and Eugene Skibbe (Minneapolis), the Tokyo National Museum, The Fukuoka Art Museum, and the Yoshida family.The catalogue features essays by Koichi Yasunaga, chief curator at the Fukuoka Art Museum, Kendall Brown, professor at California State, Long Beach, Laura W. Allen of San Francisco, Eugene M. Skibbe of Minneapolis and Matthew Welch, curator of Japanese art at The Minneapolis Institute of Arts. They provide new insights into each artist as well as a broad view of major issues confronting Japanese art in the late 19th and 20th century. The unique perspective of a single family also offers a rare opportunity to examine how family ties impact artistic creation.

Four Generations of Yoshida Family Artists

A Japanese Legacy

The Chinese themes of the Four Graybeards of Mt. Shang and the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove figure prominently in the art of Momoyama-period Japan (ca. 1575-1625). Kendall Brown proposes that the dense and multivalent implications of aesthetic reclusion central to these paintings made them appropriate for patrons of all classes - the military, who were presently in power, the aristocracy, who had lost power, and the Buddhist priesthood, who forsook power. These paintings, and their attendant messages, thus serve as dynamic cultural agents that elucidate the fundamental paradigms of early modern Japanese society. Unlike traditional art history studies, which emphasize the style and history of art objects, The Politics of Reclusion sets out to reconstruct the possible historical context for the interpretive reception and use of Chinese hermit themes within a specific period of Japanese art. In emphasizing the political dimension of aesthetic reclusion, it introduces into the field of Japanese art history a discussion of the politics of aesthetics that characterizes recent work in the field of Japanese literature. By embedding the paintings within the contexts of politics, philosophy, religion, and even gender, this study restores the reflexive relations between the paintings and their culture and, as such, is one of the first extensive intellectual and social histories of Japanese art in a Western language. It is one that will appeal not only to students of art but to those interested in Japanese literature, history, and philosophy.

Kendall H. Brown

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