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wildbrush's art.to.day - you entered my world of art history -

Comparative Advancing Art History     
 of Pigments and Mediums     
in European and Asian Cultures     

JAPAN

660 B.C., Three Precious Things were given to the founder of the Japan empire, a jewel, a sword, and a mirror. That's as far back as I can find in Japan. There were people there, they used the potter's wheel and casting molds for figures and houses placed around grave sites. Bronze was also cast, thinly, like fired clay. These people believed in a female sun god, wood was the only building material, post and lintel, the only method. No paint, no decorations. A simple "torii" post and beam, marked a religious site. Korea was the chief source of arts and crafts.

200 B.C., The Han dynasty exerts some influence through Korea that is felt in bronze and Confucian ideals.

A.D. 317-589, Tatar tribes overran China and built new temples to Budda, the Wei group was most active, carving grottoes in the Indian style. The Sui emperor in 589, ordered the repair of a million and a half images, a hundred thousand new ones, and four thousand new temples. This brought China to the highest sculpture standards and Japan, through Korea, became very proficient in carving, bronzing and painting, very quickly, a nonstop flight to the top.

A.D. 593-646, The reigning emperor is killed and the Empress Suiko starts the first art period, the first written language and temples with priests and nuns. One of the temples, the Horyu-ji in Nara, still stands today, the oldest wooden building in the world, The Suiko period produced some of the best Nipponese sculpture, nurturing their high art standards as the wooden seated Bochisattva in the Chugu-ji Nunnery in Nara shows. Frescoes were as well done as the 500 A.D. Ajanta murals of India, India teachers or well trained students painted the walls of the Golden Hall of the Horyu-ji.

Another high point is the black bronze "ya kushi" in the Golden Hall. Bronze had developed from the barest knowledge to adding silver to the mix, making a superior non-tarnishing, black bronze. The best high points of art were incorporated from Sassanian Persia, India, and China. Japan was on top.
The last Roman Emperor was displaced by German soldiers in 476, the West was gone, the Byzantine Empire remained until the Turkish conquest in 1453, but art was in a tailspin. The seesaw was working.

A.D. 646-710, The Hakuho period continued in the fine arts.

A.D. 710- 794, The later Nara period was called Tempyo, these artists were modelers rather than carvers, clay and lacquer was used. Cloth dipped in lacquer was wrapped around a wooden armature and built up with more cloth and lacquer, then it was finished with colored lacquer. This was a new permanent medium, and with it Japan reached the top standards in realistic sculpture. "High art" in "dry lacquer".

A.D. 794-897, The Jogan period, small religious feuds moved the capitol to Kyoto where art continued. Lacquer on wood was now decorating fine houses, a decorative, textile patterned wall paint. This wall painting was labeled "yamato-e". Continuous wall painting continued into continuous scrolls, the "tosa style", where a story was told on a scroll to be shown a few inches at a time. An average scroll might measure 1'4" high x 23' long, and be done in many tones with the drawing done in black. The cartoon outline was taken to new lengths by an artist named Toba Sojo, in the 12th century. In Walt Disney's style his characters were monkeys, frogs, and hares, acting like courtiers and priests. This secular art developed into the woodblock print five hundred years later.

A.D. 1000, This new worldly art has a new goddess of beauty and fortune, Kichijoten, she's no longer an Indian goddess but a colorful, lifelike noble lady, 3' high, with a halo.

A.D. 1192, Yoritomo made himself a Shogun in Kamakura, the military took over running the country. The artists were now being paid to glorify war in the highly realistic style, Shinto, the god of war, is shown as a mild mannered monk. Unkei, perhaps Japan's greatest sculptor is slightly before the great Claus Sluter of France. The East and West are now parallel in sculpturing although Japan doesn't have marble to work in.

A.D. 1274-1281, Kubilai Khan twice tries to invade Japan but each time his fleet was destroyed by storms. The Indians and the Japanese were spared Mongol domination.

A.D. 1392-1568, The Ashikaga family were the new Shoguns, ruling from Hyoto. Zen Buddhism was the favored religion and their priests controlled the art and trade of the time. The remnants of the Chinese Sung Dynasty infiltrated Japan and influenced a quieter form of art, flower arrangement and tea ceremonies were a change from the battlefields, everybody tried brush painting.

A.D. 1449-1474, The eighth Shogun gun, Yoshimasa, was a patron of all the arts, paintings went from scrolls to screens, still mainly black and white. Oda Toyo, 1420-1506, was a painter of merit, a Zen priest, ending the old style with great and simple strokes.

A.D. 1500-1550, Screens and sliding panels for homes were done by the school called Kano, bright colors and gold leaf continued in the Tosa style.

A.D. 1568-1615, The Momoyama period, civil wars and stone castles decorated with gold background screens, art was on another slide. The church and nobility ceased to be patrons. The way was left open for artists to do their own thing.

A.D. 1615-1867, Painters made designs on pottery, screens and panels. The lacquer makers, porcelain manufacturers, and woodblock print makers now had the opportunity to make their work entirely Japanese in style.

A.D. 1688-1704, The Genroku period was a time of great luxury. Tokyo was the new capital. The theater and the ladies of the Green Houses lived in a world of their own. Travelers came to the city and bought the woodblock print, done in black and white and than full color. By 1770, prints were made in as many as eleven blocks. Utamaro finally dispensed with the black outline and added powdered mica to the background. In 1794 Sharaku designed one hundred thirty prints of actors of the theater. These beautiful prints would influence some of our best European artists.

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