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Japan Specialist Seminars

Specialist Seminars

History of Japanese Art History: Establishment, Revision, and Propaganda's Details
Theme History of Japanese Art History: Establishment, Revision, and Propaganda
Presenter Yunia Roh, Ph.D. in Cultural Resources, University of Tokyo
Time April 6th, 2021 (Tuesday) 12:30-14:00
Venue Zoom Webinar
No. 251
Discussion
On April 6, 2021, the 251st Japanese Expert Invitation Seminar was held as a webinar. With more than 40 participants attending, Yunia Noh, Ph.D. in Cultural Resources, University of Tokyo gave a presentation on the subject of "The History of Japanese Art History: Establishment, Revision, and Propaganda".

The presenter analyzed the process of “establishment” of Japanese art history through the World Expositions, and compared how Japanese art history after the 2000s was “reformed” and how art was promoted in the two processes. Japanese art history was imported from Western art, and in the early days, the issues of translation and classification were emphasized in order to establish and systematize the term and system of art in accordance with Western standards. The process can be grasped by looking at the World Exposition. After the 1867 Paris Expo, when Japanese first participated, the World Exposition in Chicago in 1893 was reached, and for the first time Japanese works entered the museum and became 'fine art'. At this time, the Japanese painting was put in a frame for the museum exhibition, and it was characterized by pursuing the pure art of craft.
Meanwhile, the necessity to systematize Japanese art history not only as an exhibition, but also as an academic, was raised, and “History of Japanese Art” was published starting from the 1900 Paris Exposition. The fact that the French version of this book was published earlier than the Japanese version, and that the history of Japanese art corresponded as if it had the same structure as that of European art history, suggests that the Japanese art history under the control was produced with the Western consciousness. At the 1910 Japanese-English Exposition, which exhibited syntactic works spanning the entire era, they thoroughly analyzed them to become equal to the West, and confirmed that they tried to fit the unique Japanese frame into the Western frame through comparison and contrast with Japan.
The post-war Japanese art history, which gained its status in the international community, was revised, and in the process, Japanese culture such as Edo painting, Ukiyo-e, and Jomon period art, which was eliminated without entering the Western classification, namely, art history under the control, was rediscovered. Was used to emphasize the uniqueness of After the 2000s, especially during the period of the Japanese art boom, which included transmission to overseas, the propaganda of art history tried to differentiate itself from the Western frame. For example, when introducing Japanese art abroad, such as introducing a spring painting in the Japanese pronunciation of ‘Shunga’, the translation is not done unlike before. In addition, the return to the original position of a craftsman who pursued fine art to exhibit at the Expo Museum can be confirmed as a characteristic of the period. However, the presenter pointed out that the Western eye for art still lies at the base of the change in propaganda style.
After the presentation was over, questions and answers followed. In order to be recognized as 'art' at the Paris World Expo, what was the reason for making the subject of the work historical, how to see the two 'eyes', exclusion and revival, and about the past. What is the point of contact between the re-examination and Japanese contemporary art, whether there is a flow of criticism or correction of the situation that seems to maintain the old-fashioned premise of 'seclusion' in art history before the modern era, and the establishment process of art history with the case of Korea. The seminar was ended after a discussion on questions such as what kind of comparison would be possible.
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