Kingdom of Beauty: Mingei and the Politics of Folk Art in Imperial Japan (Asia-Pacific: Culture, Politics, and Society)
Kim Brandt
Language: English
Pages: 320
ISBN: 0822339838
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Kingdom of Beauty shows that the discovery of mingei (folk art) by Japanese intellectuals in the 1920s and 1930s was central to the complex process by which Japan became both a modern nation and an imperial world power. Kim Brandt’s account of the mingei movement locates its origins in colonial Korea, where middle-class Japanese artists and collectors discovered that imperialism offered them special opportunities to amass art objects and gain social, cultural, and even political influence. Later, mingei enthusiasts worked with (and against) other groups—such as state officials, fascist ideologues, rival folk art organizations, local artisans, newspaper and magazine editors, and department store managers—to promote their own vision of beautiful prosperity for Japan, Asia, and indeed the world. In tracing the history of mingei activism, Brandt considers not only Yanagi Muneyoshi, Hamada Shōji, Kawai Kanjirō, and other well-known leaders of the folk art movement but also the often overlooked networks of provincial intellectuals, craftspeople, marketers, and shoppers who were just as important to its success. The result of their collective efforts, she makes clear, was the transformation of a once-obscure category of pre-industrial rural artifacts into an icon of modern national style.
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of the East, the art educator Okakura Kakuzo had already informed European and Amer~ ican readers that "Japan is a museum of Asiatic civilization; and yet more than a museum, because the singular genius of the race leads it to dwell on all phases of the ideals of the past, in that spirit of living Advaitism which welcomes the new without losing the old." Okakura concluded by suggest~ ing some of the larger implications ofJapan's singular genius: ''The Chinese War [the Sino~ Japanese War
Kon prefaced his discussion with the statement, "It can be said that there is in the lifestyle of the [Korean] upper class a sad, delicate beauty such as has been recognized in the art of the Korean peninsula." 71 In 1933 Uchiyama Shozo, another collector and Korean pottery expert, wrote, "When we contemplate Yi period wares, we realize that lonely people are indeed possessed of warm hearts." 72 As suggested by Uchiyama's remark, many of those writing on Korean art during this period also
So then we decided to avoid this slang term at all costs and, feeling the need to create some other word, finally settled on the two characters of "mingei. " 20 The nature of the misunderstandings or distortions to which "getemono" gave rise is suggested by the definition given in a standard, latetwentieth-century Japanese-English dictionary: "Simple ware; folk ware; an odd thing." One of the two example sentences refers to a male subject's taste in pottery, and the other reads as follows: "He
(osetsushitsu) of"Mikuni-so," the model home originally exhibited as the "Mingeikan" at the 1928 ~xposition in Tokyo's Ueno Park. The table and chaltS were made by the Kamigamo Guild member Kuroda Tatsuaki, as was the inlaid (raden) box on the table. Courtesy ofNihon Mingeikan. THE DISCOVERY OF MINGE! 68 6g THE DISCOVERY OF MINGE! his other writings of the period. Even in the relatively liberal climate ofrg2os Japan, one may presume that strident criticism of the capitalist status quo and
considered themselves his intellectual and social equals, and that at least some of his former cohort were alienated by his autocratic tendencies. 60 In January 1932, the writer Hata Hideo attacked Yanagi at length in an article published in the ceramics magazine Chawan (Teabowl) for what he described as Yanagi's numerous "contradictions" and weaknesses. Hata claimed that Yanagi now snubbed his old companions Aoyama Jiro (along with Aoyama's elder brother, the art critic Aoyama Tamikichi),