Modern Japanese Aesthetics

Modern Japanese Aesthetics
Author: Michael F. Marra
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 340
Release: 2001-09-30
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780824820770

Modern Japanese Aesthetics is the first work in English on the history of the Japanese philosophy of art, from its inception in the 1870s to the present. In addition to the historical information and discussion of aesthetic issues that appear in the introductions to each of the chapters, the book presents English translations of otherwise inaccessible major works on Japanese aesthetics, beginning with a complete and annotated translation of the first work in the field, Nishi Amane's Bimyogaku Setsu (The Theory of Aesthetics). In its four sections (The Subject of Aesthetics, Aesthetic Categories, Poetic Expression, Postmodernism and Aesthetics), Modern Japanese Aesthetics discusses the momentous efforts made by Japanese thinkers to master, assimilate, and transform Western philosophical systems to discuss their own literary and artistic heritage. Readers are introduced to debates between the unconditional supporters of Western ideas (Onishi Hajime) and more cautious approaches to the literary and artistic past (Okakura Kakuzo, Tsubouchi Shoyo). The institutionalization of aesthetics as an academic subject is discussed and the work of some of Japan's most distinguished professional aestheticians (Onishi Yoshimori, Imamichi Tomonobu), philosophers (Kusanagi Masao, Nishitani Keiji, Sakabe Megumi), and literary critics (Karatani Kojin) is included. Modern Japanese Aesthetics is a sophisticated and energetic volume on the process that led to the construction of aesthetic categories used by Japanese and, later, Western scholars in discussing Japanese literature and arts. This important work will be essential reading for anyone concerned with the formation of a critical vocabulary in Japan. Modern Japanese Aesthetics: A Reader is a companion volume to A History of Modern Japanese Aesthetics (UH Press, 2001).

A History of Modern Japanese Aesthetics

A History of Modern Japanese Aesthetics
Author: Michael F. Marra
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 424
Release: 2001-02-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780824823993

This collection of essays constitutes the first history of modern Japanese aesthetics in any language. It introduces readers through lucid and readable translations to works on the philosophy of art written by major Japanese thinkers from the late nineteenth century to the present. Selected from a variety of sources (monographs, journals, catalogues), the essays cover topics related to the study of beauty in art and nature. The translations are organized into four parts. The first, "The Introduction of Aesthetics," traces the formation of notions of "beauty," "culture," and "art" in Japan. It includes discussion of the creation of the museum in Japan and the frenetic efforts of Nishi Amane, Okakura Tenshin, Ernest Fenollosa, and Mori Ogai to introduce German, British, and French aesthetic thought to the Japanese. This is followed by three sections that examine the transformation of the aesthetic field into an academic discipline that flourished at three major Japanese universities. "Aesthetics at Waseda University" begins with an essay on the spiritualism and idealism of Onishi Hajime and continues with essays on the impact of German Lebensphilosophie ("philosophy of life") on Shimamura Hogetsu and Takayama Chogyu, and work by the major Waseda aesthetician of the twentieth century, Aizu Yaichi. Thinkers of the Tokyo School adopted a "scientific" method in the study of art theory. Part 3, "Aesthetics at the University of Tokyo," focuses on the ideas of Otsuka Yasuji (holder of the world’s first Chair of Aesthetics), Onishi Yoshinori, Watsuji Tetsuro, Abe Jiro, Takeuchi Toshio, and Imamichi Tomonobu. The section concludes with a look at the contemporary philosopher Sakabe Megumi. The last section, "Aesthetics at the University of Kyoto," includes essays on Nakagawa Shigeki and Fukada Yasukazu, pioneers in the field of aesthetics, and on the philosophy of art of the "Kyoto School," which was deeply inspired by the thought of Nishida Kitaro. Finally the work of Kuki Shuzo, an influential teacher of Western philosophy at the University of Kyoto, is examined. A History of Modern Japanese Aesthetics is a companion volume to Modern Japanese Aesthetics: A Reader (UH Press, 1999).

Japanese Aesthetics and Culture

Japanese Aesthetics and Culture
Author: Nancy G. Hume
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 401
Release: 1995-07-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0791424006

"Some of the essays provide a general introduction to the basic theories of Japanese aesthetics, others deal with poetry and theater, and a third group discusses cultural phenomena directly related to classic Japanese literature.

Aesthetic Life

Aesthetic Life
Author: Miya Elise Mizuta Lippit
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2019-03
Genre:
ISBN: 9780674237308

This study of modern Japan engages the fields of art history, literature, and cultural studies, seeking to understand how the "beautiful woman" (bijin) emerged as a symbol of Japanese culture during the Meiji period (1868-1912). With origins in the formative period of modern Japanese art and aesthetics, the figure of the bijin appeared across a broad range of visual and textual media: photographs, illustrations, prints, and literary works, as well as fictional, critical, and journalistic writing. It eventually constituted a genre of painting called bijinga (paintings of beauties). Aesthetic Life examines the contributions of writers, artists, scholars, critics, journalists, and politicians to the discussion of the bijin and to the production of a national discourse on standards of Japanese beauty and art. As Japan worked to establish its place in the world, it actively presented itself as an artistic nation based on these ideals of feminine beauty. The book explores this exemplary figure for modern Japanese aesthetics and analyzes how the deceptively ordinary image of the beautiful Japanese woman--an iconic image that persists to this day--was cultivated as a "national treasure," synonymous with Japanese culture.

A Tractate on Japanese Aesthetics

A Tractate on Japanese Aesthetics
Author: Donald Richie
Publisher: Stone Bridge Press, Inc.
Total Pages: 82
Release: 2009-02-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0893469742

Sure to be a classic, Donald Richie's concise, profound insights into the mysteries of Japanese

New Essays in Japanese Aesthetics

New Essays in Japanese Aesthetics
Author: A. Minh Nguyen
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 527
Release: 2017-12-29
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0739180827

This collection presents twenty-seven new essays in Japanese aesthetics by leading experts in the field. Beginning with an extended foreword by the renowned scholar and artist Stephen Addiss and a comprehensive introduction that surveys the history of Japanese aesthetics and the ways in which it is similar to and different from Western aesthetics, this groundbreaking work brings together a large variety of disciplinary perspectives—including philosophy, literature, and cultural politics—to shed light on the artistic and aesthetic traditions of Japan and the central themes in Japanese art and aesthetics. Contributors explore topics from the philosophical groundings for Japanese aesthetics and the Japanese aesthetics of imperfection and insufficiency to the Japanese love of and respect for nature and the paradoxical ability of Japanese art and culture to absorb enormous amounts of foreign influence and yet maintain its own unique identity. New Essays in Japanese Aesthetics will appeal not only to a wide range of humanities scholars but also to graduate and undergraduate students of Japanese aesthetics, art, philosophy, literature, culture, and civilization. Masterfully articulating the contributors’ Japanese-aesthetical concerns and their application to Japanese arts (including literature, theater, film, drawing, painting, calligraphy, ceramics, crafts, music, fashion, comics, cooking, packaging, gardening, landscape architecture, flower arrangement, the martial arts, and the tea ceremony), these engaging and penetrating essays will also appealto nonacademic professionals and general audiences. This seminal work will be essential reading for anyone interested in gaining a deeper understanding of Japanese aesthetics.

Modern Japanese Art and the Meiji State

Modern Japanese Art and the Meiji State
Author: Dōshin Satō
Publisher: Getty Publications
Total Pages: 378
Release: 2011
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1606060597

This is an insightful and intelligent re-thinking of Japanese art history & its Western influences. This broad-ranging and profoundly influential analysis describes how Western art institutions and vocabulary were transplanted to Japan in the late nineteenth century. In the 1870-80s, artists and government administrators in Japan encountered the Western 'system of the arts' for the first time. Under pressure to exhibit and sell its artistic products abroad, Japan's new Meiji government came face-to-face with the need to create European-style art schools and museums - and even to establish Japanese words for art, painting, artist, and sculpture. "Modern Japanese Art" is a full re-conceptualization of the field of Japanese art history, exposing the politics through which the words, categories, and values that structure our understanding of the field came to be while revealing the historicity of Western and non-Western art history.

History of Art in Japan

History of Art in Japan
Author: Nobuo Tsuji
Publisher:
Total Pages: 632
Release: 2019-08-27
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780231193412

In this book the leading authority on Japanese art history sheds light on how Japan has nurtured distinctive aesthetics, prominent artists, and movements that have achieved global influence and popularity. The History of Art in Japan discusses works ranging from earthenware figurines in 13,000 BCE to manga, anime, and modern subcultures.

The Ethics of Aesthetics in Japanese Cinema and Literature

The Ethics of Aesthetics in Japanese Cinema and Literature
Author: Nina Cornyetz
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2006-11-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 1135985138

This is an innovative, scholarly and original study of the ethics of modern Japanese aesthetics from the 1930s, through the Second World War and into the post-war period. Nina Cornyetz embarks on new and unprecedented readings of some of the most significant literary and film texts of the Japanese canon, for instance works by Kawabata Yasunari, Mishima Yukio, Abe Kôbô and Shinoda Masahiro, all renowned for their texts' aesthetic and philosophic brilliance. Cornyetz uniquely opens up the field in a fresh and controversial way by showing how these authors and filmmakers' concepts of beauty and relation to others were, in fact, deeply impacted by political and social factors. Probing questions are asked such as: How did Japanese fascism and imperialism ideologically, politically and aesthetically impact on these literary/cinematic giants? How did the emperor as the 'nodal point' for Japanese national identity affect their ethics? What were the repercussions of the virtual collapse of the Marxist movement in the 1960s? What are the similarities and differences between pre-war, wartime and post-war ideals of beauty and those of fascist aesthetics in general? This ground-breaking work is truly interdisciplinary and will appeal to students and scholars of Japanese literature, film, gender, culture, history and even psychoanalytic theory.

History of Japanese Art

History of Japanese Art
Author: Penelope E. Mason
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2005
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780131176010

Japanese art, like so many expressions of Japanese culture, is fascinatingly rich in its contrasts and paradoxes. Since the country opened its doors to the outside world in the mid-nineteenth century. Japanese art and culture have enjoyed an immense popularity in the West. When in 1993 renowned scholar Penelope Mason wrote the the first edition of History of Japanese Art, it was the first such volume in thirty yearsto chart a detailed overview of the subject. It remains the only comprehensive survey of its kind in English. This second edition ties together more closely the development of all the media within a well-articulated historical and social context. New to the Second Edition Extended coverage of Japanese art beyond 1945 New discoveries both in archeology and scholarship New material on calligraphy, ceramics, lacquerware, metalware, and textiles An extended glossary A comprehensively updated bibliography 94 new illustrations