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The MFAH Unearths Lost History with Meiji Modern

Image of a Japanese woman holding a book

Five years in the making, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston proudly presents their newest summer exhibition: Meiji Modern: Fifty Years of New Japan. This intricate and meticulously organized exhibition brings together nearly 200 works of art from across mediums that showcase the rapid changes in Japan during this period. 

The artwork, split into five distinct yet cohesive sections covering topics from personal fashion to changes in Japan’s relationship with the sea that surrounds it, displays the country and how it interacted with Western culture and practices for the first time in its history. 

The term “Meiji” comes from the name of the Japanese emperor during this period, which is usually classified as meaning the years between 1868 and 1912. Also seen as Japan’s Victorian period, the art shows how Japanese society responded to its trade treaties with countries such as the United States and overall opening to the rest of the world. Artists were now able to travel throughout Europe and bring back the techniques they learned in places such as Paris to Japan and apply them to topics of Japanese mythology and tradition. 

Led through the exhibit by its co-curators, Chelsea Foxwell and Bradley Bailey, the first piece of art visitors encounter is a large, flower-decorated cloisonné enamel vase by Gotō Shozaburō, tilted Vase with Blossoming Flowers. There are numerous pieces of this medium throughout the exhibit, as it was popular at the time for its depth of artistry and intricate execution. 

One of the standout aspects of this exhibit is that, through extensive research, its curators were able to find pieces of Japanese art from this period that were once thought lost. One such piece is Temptation, by Kaishū, a hanging scroll with ink and color on paper. The piece was found in a collection in Hawaii, where it is thought the painter completed the piece.

 It is a portrayal of a blindfolded Japanese woman being led to the right, the Western direction, by a foreigner, as a Japanese deity swoops in to lead her back to the East. Such a depiction showcases the doubts many Japanese people had about the introduction of Western customs into their culture. 

The oil painting Flowers, by Mitsutani Kunishirō, is an exploration of traditional Japanese-Western style painting, inspired by the portraiture of European salon painting. It depicts a young, beautiful Japanese woman, idle and dressed in traditional Japanese kimono. The work is associated with the more “old school” style of Western-style painting but done with a Japanese subject by a Japanese artist. The striking use of oil painting was not common for Japanese art until this period when those materials became available through trade. 

Another image that showcases the interaction of traditional Japanese beauty standards and European ones is This Beauty, by Hashiguchi Goyō, a color lithograph that won an advertisement contest hosted by a new department store, which had not appeared in Japan until this period. The woman in the poster sports a bouffant hairstyle and is surrounded by motifs of the Western Art Nouveau style while holding an album of Edo-period woodblock prints. The juxtaposition here of the new style of dress and the photos of the older style of dress showcases a new kind of beauty standard in Japan, one that is rooted in tradition but heavily influenced by incoming Western styles.

Another piece further on in the exhibit, a bronze sculpture titled Dragon King Presenting a Jewel to Fujiwara no Hidesato by Ōshima Joun, intricately depicts a scene from a Japanese legend. The Dragon King presents a tide-controlling jewel, here depicted by a crystal orb, to a Japanese warrior. The piece, previously displayed at the Dallas Museum of Art, had not been fully cleaned before its display at the MFAH. Now, the details of the sculpture work are fully on display. 

The Dragon King’s armor is entirely constructed of turtle shells and stingray leather, the facial expressions of the King and the warrior are wrought with incredible intricacy, and the bronze waves appear to be crashing against the rocks. Pieces such as this enshrined the myths that are part of Japanese tradition as many changes occurred in their society. It also served to memorialize their stories and legends, as European artists have done for centuries. 

Meiji Modern thoroughly immerses visitors into the world of the Meiji period in Japan, and the art that was created in response to the changing times. The exhibit is a must-see for Houstonians this summer, as it is a collection unlike any other of its kind. It runs until September 15th, 2024. 

 

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