English edition of key essays on Japanese art history History of Japanese Art after 1945 surveys the development of art in Japan since WWII. The original Japanese work, which has become essential reading for those with an interest in modern and contemporary Japanese art and is a foundational resource for students and researchers, spans a period of 150 years, from the 1850s to the 2010s. Each chapter is dedicated to a specific period and written by a specialist. The English edition first discusses the formation and evolution of Japanese contemporary art from 1945 to the late 1970s, subsequently deals with the rise of the fine-art museum from the late 1970s to the 1990s, and concludes with an overview of contemporary Japanese art dating from the 1990s to the 2010s. These three parts are preceded by a new introduction that contextualizes both the original Japanese and the English editions and introduces the reader to the emergence of the concept of art (bijutsu) in modern Japan. This English-language edition provides valuable reading material that offers a deeper insight into contemporary Japanese art. With an introduction by Kajiya Kenji. Contributors: Kitazawa Noriaki (editor), Mori Hitoshi (editor), Sato Doushin (editor), Tom Kain (translation editor), Alice Kiwako Ashiwa (translator), Kenneth Masaki Shima (translator), Ariel Acosta (translator), and Sara Sumpter (translator) Translated from the original Japanese edition published with Tokyo Bijutsu, 2014 In cooperation with Art Platform Japan / The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan Art Platform Japan is an initiative by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan, to maintain the sustainable development of the contemporary art scene in Japan.

This provocative book, the first in English on Japanese avant-garde art after 1945, is the catalogue of the most ambitious exhibition of its kind. It surveys some 200 works--from painting and sculpture to performance and video--by more than 100 artists. The exhibition comes to the Guggenheim Museum, New York, in September. Over 445 illustrations, 200 in full color.

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

This book examines a set of paintings produced in Japan during the 1930s and early 1940s that have received little scholarly attention. Asato Ikeda views the work of four prominent artists of the time—Yokoyama Taikan, Yasuda Yukihiko, Uemura Shōen, and Fujita Tsuguharu—through the lens of fascism, showing how their seemingly straightforward paintings of Mount Fuji, samurai, beautiful women, and the countryside supported the war by reinforcing a state ideology that justified violence in the name of the country’s cultural authenticity. She highlights the politics of “apolitical” art and challenges the postwar labeling of battle paintings—those depicting scenes of war and combat—as uniquely problematic. Yokoyama Taikan produced countless paintings of Mount Fuji as the embodiment of Japan’s “national body” and spirituality, in contrast to the modern West’s individualism and materialism. Yasuda Yukihiko located Japan in the Minamoto warriors of the medieval period, depicting them in the yamato-e style, which is defined as classically Japanese. Uemura Shōen sought to paint the quintessential Japanese woman, drawing on the Edo-period bijin-ga (beautiful women) genre while alluding to noh aesthetics and wartime gender expectations. For his subjects, Fujita Tsuguharu looked to the rural snow country, where, it was believed, authentic Japanese traditions could still be found. Although these artists employed different styles and favored different subjects, each maintained close ties with the state and presented what he considered to be the most representative and authentic portrayal of Japan. Throughout Ikeda takes into account the changing relationships between visual iconography/artistic style and its significance by carefully situating artworks within their specific historical and cultural moments. She reveals the global dimensions of wartime nationalist Japanese art and opens up the possibility of dialogue with scholarship on art produced in other countries around the same time, particularly Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. The Politics of Painting will be welcomed by those interested in modern Japanese art and visual culture, and war art and fascism. Its analysis of painters and painting within larger currents in intellectual history will attract scholars of modern Japanese and East Asian studies.

Catalog of an exhibition held at the Japan Society Gallery, New York, N.Y., Mar. 16-June 17, 2012, the John and Mable Ringing Museum, Sarasota, Fla., July 14- Sept. 30, 2012, and the Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, Fla., Nov. 9-Jan. 19, 2014.

"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 first edition of History of Japanese Art, it was the first such volume in thirty years to 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."--Page 4 of cover.