Japonism

Japonism ( also in French Japonisme or Japonaiserie ) is the name given to the influence of Japanese art on the artists of the Western world, particularly French. The art that emerged from this source of inspiration is called Japonesque.

The images and style of the "Images of serene, floating world " of ukiyo -e, and other products of the Japanese arts and crafts such as pottery, metal, lacquer and bamboo works were a source of inspiration for the Impressionism, Art Nouveau, Art Nouveau, the Viennese Secession and many artists of Expressionism.

History

Due to the internal pressure of the reformer and the external pressure of the colonial powers, led by the Americans under Matthew Perry, Japan ended in the 1850s, his long-lasting insulation. Just as Western techniques of painting, printing and photography now arrived in Japan, Japanese Woodblock took the opposite route to Europe, first as a packaging material for tea and other goods. In Europe, however, the high artistic value of these prints was detected, and there was a veritable mania for collecting Japanese art. The term " Japonisme " was coined in 1872 by the French art critic Philippe Burty. In the 1870s and 1880s French collector, aesthetes and art critic took trips to Japan, which is a series of essays about Japanese art and increased trade caused it. Among them, the economist Henri Cernuschi and the critic Théodore Duret (both 1871-1872), and the British collector William Anderson, who taught several years medicine in Edo. Anderson's collection was later acquired by the British Museum. Several dealers in Japanese art were established in Paris, including Hayashi Tadamasa and Jijima Hanjuro. Probably the most important contribution came originally from Hamburg, Siegfried Bing ( Samuel Bing). The Paris World Exhibition of 1878 showed a number of works of Japanese art.

Artists and styles

Japanese artists who exerted a great influence, were Utamaro, Hokusai and Hiroshige. But while booming interest in Japanese prints in Europe, led the cultural renewal (文明 开化, bummei kaika ) in Japan to an increased interest in Western art and a loss of prestige for traditional Japanese artists and techniques.

Japonisme in France

Among the artists who have been influenced in France by Japanese art, for example, were Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Edgar Degas, Paul Gauguin and Vincent van Gogh. Manet's enthusiasm for Japanese art is particularly evident in his portrait of the writer Émile Zola. Many of Van Gogh's paintings imitate ukiyo -e in style and theme. Le Père Tanguy example that portrays the owner of a shop selling art supplies, shows six different woodcuts in the background. Van Gogh painted the picture The Courtesan in 1887 after an ukiyo -e from Kesai iron on the cover of the magazine Paris Illustrée, Le Japon. At this time, in Antwerp, he already collected Japanese stamps.

Ukiyo -e with its curved lines and the contrasting empty spaces, its schematic structure and the two-dimensionality of its image plane, also inspired Art Nouveau. Some line shapes and curve patterns were added to graphic set pieces, which were found in the works of artists around the world later.

The stylistic device of Japanese color woodcut was particularly appreciated by the painters of the School of Pont -Aven and the Nabis and disseminated. The latter understood Japanese woodcuts, interestingly, as folk art.

Japonism in Germany

A native of Prague German -speaking, in Vienna and Berlin working Emil Orlik toured in 1900/ 01 Japan. From there, he brought with drawings which he - the Japanese color woodcuts following technically and thematically - transposed in own woodcuts and etchings. Stylistically, however, be complete works of Japanese art was unaffected.

The first major exhibition of art from the Far East took place in 1909 in Munich under the title "Japan and East Asia in the Art".

In Germany there were two Russians, Werefkin and Alexej Jawlensky, who collected Japanese art at the beginning of the 20th century and grappled intensively with the Far Eastern art. Printmaking, they anverwandelten be influenced her painting style and enriched the expressionist painting.

Other works of art equivalent, served Werefkin and Jawlensky Japanese woodblock prints as wall decorations. It is assumed that to them was her boyfriend Gustav Pauli, one of the then leading German experts to help Japan build their Japanese collection. The collection mainly works by Kunisada were, in addition, there were also some works of Hokusai, Utamaro and Kuniyoshi.

Werefkin and Jawlensky's colleague Franz Marc and August Macke were also admirers of Japanese art. Also they collected craft items, Ukiyo-e Shunga and leaves, also as Jawlensky. The Castle Murnau pointed in the exhibition, the painter of the " Blue Rider " and Japan that lasted from 21 July to 6 August 2011, the first time the influence of Japanese art on the artists of Der Blaue Reiter. Collection of pieces of painters, including the Japanese art collection Franz Marc's work as well as examples of artists formed the spectrum of the exhibition.

In the middle of Wassily Kandinsky and Marc May 1912 issued, provided with 144 Illustrations almanac Der Blaue Reiter, play Japanese pictures compared to non-European ethnological or Bavarian and Russian folklore image examples, a fairly minor role.

In an exhibition at the Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern for the first time referred to the employment of Paul Klee with East Asian art, 2013. It runs until May 12 under the title From Japonism to Zen. Paul Klee and the Far East.

Japonism in England

The American James McNeill Whistler counts in the Western European art history today, " the first collectors and recipients, so to speak, the first to Japonisten 'at all ." Growing up in Russia, he was already over 11 years of drawing classes at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. After the death of his father in 1849 the family returned to America. As he continued his artistic training in 1855 in Paris, he learned Asian know. From the exotic art objects he was so fascinated that he is a collection grew, he brought to England when he moved to London in 1859, where he initially made ​​a significant contribution to the spread of Japan is the only fashion.

In his house, which he ausstaffierte with Japanese and Chinese folding screens, fans and porcelain, he had constantly before Asian eyes, which he processed in his paintings and etchings.