30 Exhibitions
STYLED WITH POISE Figures in Japanese Paintings and Prints
Tis exhibition is a sophisticated one in that it is neither a display of costumes per se, arranged on display stands or mannequins inside glass cases, nor is it an exhibition of prints per se to be appreciated for their beauty and composition. It is a double-subject exhibition, as it were, because Japanese costumes of every conceivable types are depicted as a part of a print’s larger composition. Te costumes, whether religious or secular, are actually being displayed in situ, making their use immediately understandable to visitors. Te exhibition draws together and uses a wide variety of Japanese paintings and prints from the Edo period (1603–1868) to demonstrate its message, displaying works from the Minneapolis Institute of Art and from private collections in both Boston and Dallas. Tese subject matters can range from benevolent Buddhist deities to townsfolk going about their business, images from theology and history, farmers and other workers, courtiers and Westerners in Japan in the late Edo period. Utagawa Yoshikazu, active around 1850-1870, is best known for his depictions of foreigners, both men and women, in the case of this exhibition, the United States, England and France from a series entitled Series of Foreigners Depicted with Flags. Te United States print depicts an American horseman with epaulets seated astride a rearing chestnut mount. Tere are other depictions of foreigners, including a triptych by Yoshikazu entitled Picture of Foreigners’ Revelry at the Gankiro, Miyozaki, Kamakura, and all of these foreigner prints accurately display what was then contemporary Western fashions. An outstanding print of the
period at the Crow Collection is from Ichiyusai Kuniyoshi’s series, One Hundred Poems by One Hundred Poets, circa 1842. It depicts a tranquil scene of a man at a fish trap and this print displays not only the quality of printing and the use of vegetable and mineral colours, but is also a gentle composition with the fisherman as an integral part of a large natural scene and its early stage of printing as seen by the presence of a printing block’s wood grain in the sky above. A particularly fine display of costume is in a triptych of actors by Gototei Hirosada (1819-1865), aka Utagawa Hirosada, a particularly outstanding Osaka print artist. Osaka prints are relatively easy to spot because they are usually slightly smaller than the Edo traditional oban-size prints, but because the facial depictions are different. Tese three actors from the same generation are dressed in elaborately patterned and boldly coloured costumes of their roles. Among the paintings, which
include three Buddhist scrolls, is a delicate hanging scroll by Kamisaka Sekka (1866-1942), Seven Gods of Good Fortune, from the Meiji or Taisho period. On loan from the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art & Culture, it is a fine revival of the Maruyama School style as perfected by Maruyama Okyo and Nagasawa Rosetsu in the eighteenth century. His use of soft colours,
ASIAN ART OCTOBER 2017
Lady Tokiwa Fleeing with Her Children by Utagawa Kunitsugu (1800-1861), Edo period (1603-1868), 1850s, hanging scroll, ink and colour on paper, 111.13 × 57.47 cm. On Loan from the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art & Culture
Te Seven Gods of Good Fortune by Kamisaka Sekka (1866-1942), Meiji (1868-1912) or Taisho period (1912-26), early 20th century, hanging scroll, ink and colour on silk 123.98 × 48.74 cm. On Loan from the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art & Culture
applied thinly and with little emphasis on outlines is very much in keeping with the New Japan School of the early 20th century and this allows for depictions of the seven’s costumes in soft bleeding of colours in gradual transitions. Of all the images in the exhibition, the most powerfully dynamic is a painting by Utagawa Kunitsugu (1800-1861) of Lady Tokiwa Fleeing with Her Children. A hanging scroll of ink, colour and gofun (cooked and powdered shells for white pigment) on paper, it is on loan from the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art & Culture). It is datable to the 1850s, but it is a version of Kuniyoshi’s print of the same subject from 1848 and the exact reasons behind its creation are not known. Te story behind the subject begins in 1159, when the powerful Taira clan, blood enemies of the Minamoto clan, eventually defeated them in battle during the Hotoke Rebellion of 1160 and the head of the Minamoto clan, Minamoto Yoshitomo, was killed. His wife, Lady Tokiwa Gozen (1138-1180), fled the palace in a snowstorm with her three sons to escape death. One of her sons was Minamoto Yoshitsune later grew up to avenge his clan as head of the Minamoto, which he was finally able to do at the naval battle at Dan-no-Ura in 1185.
Te execution of Kuniyoshi’s print
is from right to left and the snow is depicted as already having fallen against a clear sky. It is well- composed, but it lacks energy. Kunitsugu’s painting is anything but static. Te scene is during a snowstorm with the blown snow depicted by a scattering of white pigment and the power of the wind is shown by whipped clothing and lost headgear while one son stumbles after losing his geta sandal. Tis story was adapted in 1954 by
a powerful and iconic black and white film masterpiece by Kenji Mizugushi, Sansho the Bailiff. In this film, an idealistic governor disobeys his feudal master, daimyo, and is sent into exile. His wife, together with her sons, flees in search of him, but instead, is attacked by mercenaries of a save trader, Sansho. Her sons evade capture, but she was taken to the slave camp and soon attempts to escape. To prevent further attempts her Achilles tendons are cut, leaving her permanently crippled. Te film ends with bittersweetness worthy of the ancient Greeks. One of her sons had found his place in a position of power and as a grown man set off on horseback to try to find his mother. What he found was an old, shrivelled and crippled woman, but the tragi-happiness of the reunion lives as one of the most dramatic ever captured on film and serve as the director’s message that good will come from resilience in the face of evil.
Te old adage says that a picture is
worth a thousand words, but what comes as a message from this exhibition is that one thousand words deserve a picture. Martin Barnes Lorber Until 7 January 2018, at the Crow Collection, Dallas,
crowcollection.org
FAIRGROUNDS OF THE FAITHFUL of Egypt
From Morocco to Indonesia, there are hundreds of thousands of Sufis. One of their most vibrant expressions can be found in the Egyptian Sufi/ Dervish festivals called moulids, which celebrate the birth of Islamic saints who founded a particular Sufi order. (Moulid means to give birth in Arabic.) In every moulid there is spiritual activity accompanied by a cacophony of sounds, smells and colours. For days the normal activities of the mundane world virtually cease to exist, instead devotees bow down in submission to and celebration of the Divine.
One of the most important activities of the moulid is the zikr. Here, sometimes devotees line up, in front of musicians and rhythmically
sway back and forth, whilst chanting the name of God. Te hypnotic music and often hyperventilated breathing induce a state of trance in which the dervish claims to find union with God. Tim Coleman first started photographing these celebrations in 1990 when he went to the moulid of Sayed el Badawi, in Tanta, the largest moulid in the world. He later made the documentary film – Beyond the Pyramids Lie Fairgrounds of the Faithful’–one of the few full-length documentaries on the subject and it is included in this exhibition From 12 October to 16 December, Te Brunei Gallery, SOAS, London,
soas.ac.uk/gallery
Portrait of a sufi sheik by Tim Coleman
SCYTHIANS Warriors of Ancient Siberia
Te culture of the powerful nomadic tribes, the Scythians, who thrived in a vast landscape stretching from southern Russia to China and the northern Black Sea is being brought to life at the British Museum this autumn. Te Scythians were exceptional horsemen and warriors, and feared adversaries and neighbours of the ancient Greeks, Assyrians and Persians between 900 and 200 BC. Tis exhibition, the first in over 40 years in the UK, tells their story through archaeological discoveries and perfectly preserved objects frozen in time. Most of the items are exceptionally well preserved as they have come from burial mounds in the high Altai mountains of southern Siberia, where the frozen ground prevented them from deteriorating. Over 200 objects reveal all aspects
of Scythian life, including a major loan in collaboration with the State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, and other generous loans from the National Museum of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Ashmolean Museum and the Royal Collection. Some are star pieces which are displayed in the permanent galleries and Treasury of the State Hermitage
Museum and others that have never been loaned to the UK before. Te exhibition explores who the Scythians were, how they looked and what they wore – as well as what they traded, ate and drank. In about the second century BC,
the Scythians disappeared and were replaced by other nomadic powers and the final section of the exhibition explorers what happened afterwards and looks at life in southern Siberia in the early centuries of the millennium,through these objects frozen in time. Until 14 January, at the British Museum,
britishmuseum.org
Plaque depicting a Scythian rider with a spear in his right hand, gold, second half of the fourth century BC, Kul’ Oba © Te State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, 2017. Photo: V Terebenin
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