Ebook: History of Japanese art

Japanese art, like so many expressions of Japanese culture, is fascinatingly complex in its simplicity and intriguingly rich in its Contrasts and paradoxes. In a 15th-century Zen painting, the barest washes of ink can evoke the sensations of wandering alone into a fog-brushed forest of pines, while a folding screen painted less than a century later may be gaudily splashed with bright flowers and bristling roosters.
The painting, sculpture, architecture, and ceramics of Japan are the subject of History of Japanese Art, the only comprehensive survey available in English that grounds these arts in the contexts from which they sprang: social, political, religious, and intellectual. Enriched by 456 illustrations of exceptional range and depth, the text takes the reader on a journey of discovery, from the earliest ceramic wares on earth—prehistoric Jdmon vessels of circa 10,500 b.c.e.—through Westernized paintings and sculptures by 20th-century Meiji and Taisho artists working up to the outbreak of World War II. Along the way, the reader is encouraged to pause and look at works in depth: the 7th-century Horyuji temple complex near Nara; a pair of Pure Land Buddhist mandalas; an early-12th-century hand scroll illustrating the Tale of Genji; a late- 15th-century tea room in a Buddhist temple compound; the painted panels (fusuma) of Nijo Palace in Kyoto; a glazed tea-ceremony vessel from the 19th century. Shinto and Buddhist beliefs are brought into focus as sources of iconography and powerful influences on Japanese aesthetics, and the findings of the most recent archaeological discoveries are incorporated. Styles are explored and explained in terms of artistic impulse, patronage, and outside influences.
Adding to the pleasure and long-lasting usefulness of History of Japanese Art are explanatory notes throughout that highlight important terms and concepts; special illustrated sections on techniques and processes integral to Japanese art; a thorough glossary and an inviting annotated guide to the literature of Japanese art and culture.