1.
Torii Kiyomasu
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Torii Kiyomasu was a Japanese painter and printmaker of the Torii school, in the genre of ukiyo-e. Like the other Torii artists, his focus was on Kabuki billboards, advertisements, actor prints. Many scholars believe Kiyomasu to have been the brother or son of Torii Kiyonobu I, one of the founders of the school. In the 1710s, prints signed with Kiyomasus name far outnumber those with the signature of Kiyonobu, on the other hand, even if the two were the same person, this could simply be explained by the use of different names on different types of work. Though his style is said to be more graceful than Kiyonobus, they are difficult to tell apart. However, there are certain elements that do stand out as differences between the two artists. This shift is attributed to an emulation of the styles of Moronobus chief competitor, images from the Floating World, The Japanese Print
2.
Torii school
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This article is about a school of ukiyo-e art, for the sculpture style, see Tori style. For the Torii samurai clan, see Torii clan, the Torii school was a school of ukiyo-e painting and printing founded in Edo. The primary producers of kabuki signboards and other promotional materials. Their style was one of the influences in the ukiyo-e depiction of actors. Still today, kabuki signboards are sometimes painted by members of the Torii family, the Torii style truly emerged with Torii Kiyonobu I, who came to Edo in 1687. The Torii family had already been active in the world, in Osaka. He studied under Yoshida Hanbei and Hishikawa Moronobu, and brought a kabuki sensibility to their artistic styles. Moronobus work was dramatic and energetic, but Kiyonobu added to this with a further emphasis on action. For many years, Kiyonobu and his actor father Torii Kiyomoto produced primarily theater signboards, book illustrations and it was not until 1700 that the Torii began to create full-size paintings and prints that could be interpreted as independent works of art. Of course, many still depicted actors and the kabuki world, but by this time Kiyonobu, and his successor Torii Kiyonobu II, were also producing paintings and prints of courtesans, erotic scenes, and sumo. As such, Kiyonobu, and the heads of the clan after him, worked primarily on these types of works, leaving relatively few paintings, Torii Kiyomasu, and his successors, would represent something of a departure from the theatrical and energetic core style of the Torii school. Taking Sugimura Jihei as a model, rather than Moronobu, Kiyomasu produced works far softer, more delicate. Nevertheless, it is interesting that many works by other artists. Even as other schools and styles emerged over the course of the 18th century and it was something every artist had to either embrace and elaborate on, or to reject entirely. The Torii style, even in paintings and prints, continued to be derived directly from the work for the kabuki theaters. Their style was bombastic, dramatic, and somewhat idealized, one of the primary elements of their particular style was the use of bold, thick lines, attracting the eye of the viewer, and giving the composition an overall boldness. This element was embraced by a number of artists, particularly the Kaigetsudō school, Torii Kiyonobu II and Kiyomasu II, the second generation of the school, saw it to its climax. Both artists were active from the 1720s to the 1760s, and consolidated the bolder style of Kiyonobu with the more graceful, delicate style of Kiyomasu
3.
The Great Wave off Kanagawa
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The Great Wave off Kanagawa, also known as The Great Wave or simply The Wave, is a woodblock print by the Japanese ukiyo-e artist Hokusai. It was published sometime between 1829 and 1833 in the late Edo period as the first print in Hokusais series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji and it is Hokusais most famous work, and one of the most recognizable works of Japanese art in the world. The image depicts an enormous wave threatening boats off the coast of the prefecture of Kanagawa, while sometimes assumed to be a tsunami, the wave is more likely to be a large rogue wave. As in all the prints in the series, it depicts the area around Mount Fuji under particular conditions, Hokusai began painting when he was six years old and at twelve, his father sent him to work at a booksellers. At sixteen, he was apprenticed as an engraver and spent three years learning the trade, at the same time he began to produce his own illustrations. At eighteen he was accepted as an apprentice to Katsukawa Shunshō, in 1804 he became famous as an artist when, during a festival in Tokyo, he completed a 240m² painting of a Buddhist monk named Daruma. In 1814, he published the first of fifteen volumes of sketches entitled Manga and his Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, from which the Great Wave comes, was produced from around c. 1830. From the sixteenth century fantastic depictions of waves crashing on rocky shores were painted on folding screens known as rough seas screens, Hokusai drew many waves throughout his career, the genesis of the Great Wave can be traced back over thirty years. Kōkans A View of Seven-League Beach was executed in middle of 1796, in both precursor works, the subjects are in the midst of a storm, beneath a great wave that threatens to devour them. Their rigidity and verticality evoke the shape of a mountain, while in the Great Wave the wave stands out because it is more active, dynamic, and aggressive. The earlier images are marked by the perspective traditionally used in Japanese painting. The Great Wave, on the hand, is depicted in a more western perspective. In the earlier prints the horizon is in the middle, whereas in the Great Wave the horizon is so low that it forces the viewers eye to the center of the action. In the first two, there is a boat on the crest of the wave, as if it had managed to escape. Hokusai eliminated this element for the Great Wave, because it interfered with the dynamic of the curve or to make the more dramatic. The two first prints have a composition, lacking consistency, whereas the Great Wave only has two important masses, the wave itself, and the vanishing point beneath the wave. The wave shows the level of control that Hokusai had reached, the image, although simple in its design is, however, the result of a long process, a methodical reflection. This print is a yoko-e, that is, a landscape format produced to the ōban size, the composition comprises three main elements, the sea whipped up by a storm, three boats and a mountain
4.
Hokusai
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Katsushika Hokusai was a Japanese artist, ukiyo-e painter and printmaker of the Edo period. He was influenced by Sesshū Tōyō and other styles of Chinese painting, born in Edo, Hokusai is best known as author of the woodblock print series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji which includes the internationally iconic print, The Great Wave off Kanagawa. Hokusai created the Thirty-Six Views both as a response to a travel boom and as part of a personal obsession with Mount Fuji. It was this series, specifically The Great Wave print and Fine Wind, Clear Morning, as historian Richard Lane concludes, Indeed, if there is one work that made Hokusais name, both in Japan and abroad, it must be this monumental print-series. While Hokusais work prior to this series is important, it was not until this series that he gained broad recognition. Hokusais date of birth is unclear, but is stated as the 23rd day of the 9th month of the 10th year of the Hōreki era to an artisan family, in the Katsushika district of Edo. It is believed his father was the mirror-maker Nakajima Ise, who produced mirrors for the shogun and his father never made Hokusai an heir, so it is possible that his mother was a concubine. Hokusai began painting around the age of six, perhaps learning from his father, Hokusai was known by at least thirty names during his lifetime. While the use of names was a common practice of Japanese artists of the time. Hokusais name changes are so frequent, and so related to changes in his artistic production and style. At 14, he worked as an apprentice to a wood-carver, until the age of 18, Shunshō was an artist of ukiyo-e, a style of wood block prints and paintings that Hokusai would master, and head of the so-called Katsukawa school. Ukiyo-e, as practiced by artists like Shunshō, focused on images of the courtesans, after a year, Hokusais name changed for the first time, when he was dubbed Shunrō by his master. It was under this name that he published his first prints, during the decade he worked in Shunshōs studio, Hokusai was married to his first wife, about whom very little is known except that she died in the early 1790s. He married again in 1797, although this second wife died after a short time. He fathered two sons and three daughters with two wives, and his youngest daughter Sakae, also known as Ōi, eventually became an artist. Upon the death of Shunshō in 1793, Hokusai began exploring other styles of art and he was soon expelled from the Katsukawa school by Shunkō, the chief disciple of Shunshō, possibly due to studies at the rival Kanō school. This event was, in his own words, inspirational, What really motivated the development of my style was the embarrassment I suffered at Shunkōs hands. Hokusai also changed the subjects of his works, moving away from the images of courtesans, instead, his work became focused on landscapes and images of the daily life of Japanese people from a variety of social levels
5.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
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The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially the Met, is located in New York City and is the largest art museum in the United States, and is among the most visited art museums in the world. Its permanent collection contains two million works, divided among seventeen curatorial departments. The main building, on the edge of Central Park along Manhattans Museum Mile, is by area one of the worlds largest art galleries. A much smaller second location, The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park in Upper Manhattan, contains a collection of art, architecture. On March 18,2016, the museum opened the Met Breuer museum at Madison Avenue in the Upper East Side, it extends the museums modern, the Met maintains extensive holdings of African, Asian, Oceanian, Byzantine, Indian, and Islamic art. The museum is home to collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, as well as antique weapons. Several notable interiors, ranging from first-century Rome through modern American design, are installed in its galleries, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in 1870. The founders included businessmen and financiers, as well as leading artists and thinkers of the day and it opened on February 20,1872, and was originally located at 681 Fifth Avenue. The Met maintains extensive holdings of African, Asian, Oceanian, Byzantine, the museum is also home to encyclopedic collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, and antique weapons and armor from around the world. A number of interiors, ranging from 1st century Rome through modern American design, are permanently installed in the Mets galleries. In addition to its permanent exhibitions, the Met organizes and hosts traveling shows throughout the year. The director of the museum is Thomas P. Campbell, a long-time curator and it was announced on February 28th,2017 that Campbell will be stepping down as the Mets director and CEO, effective June. On March 1st,2017 the BBC reported that Daniel Weiss shall be the acting CEO until a replacement is found, Beginning in the late 19th century, the Met started to acquire ancient art and artifacts from the Near East. From a few tablets and seals, the Mets collection of Near Eastern art has grown to more than 7,000 pieces. The highlights of the include a set of monumental stone lamassu, or guardian figures. The Mets Department of Arms and Armor is one of the museums most popular collections. Among the collections 14,000 objects are many pieces made for and used by kings and princes, including armor belonging to Henry VIII of England, Henry II of France, Rockefeller donated his more than 3, 000-piece collection to the museum. The Mets Asian department holds a collection of Asian art, of more than 35,000 pieces, the collection dates back almost to the founding of the museum, many of the philanthropists who made the earliest gifts to the museum included Asian art in their collections
6.
Perspective (graphical)
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Perspective in the graphic arts is an approximate representation, on a flat surface, of an image as it is seen by the eye. If viewed from the spot as the windowpane was painted. Each painted object in the scene is thus a flat, scaled down version of the object on the side of the window. All perspective drawings assume the viewer is a distance away from the drawing. Objects are scaled relative to that viewer, an object is often not scaled evenly, a circle often appears as an ellipse and a square can appear as a trapezoid. This distortion is referred to as foreshortening, Perspective drawings have a horizon line, which is often implied. This line, directly opposite the viewers eye, represents objects infinitely far away and they have shrunk, in the distance, to the infinitesimal thickness of a line. It is analogous to the Earths horizon, any perspective representation of a scene that includes parallel lines has one or more vanishing points in a perspective drawing. A one-point perspective drawing means that the drawing has a vanishing point, usually directly opposite the viewers eye. All lines parallel with the line of sight recede to the horizon towards this vanishing point. This is the standard receding railroad tracks phenomenon, a two-point drawing would have lines parallel to two different angles. Any number of vanishing points are possible in a drawing, one for each set of lines that are at an angle relative to the plane of the drawing. Perspectives consisting of parallel lines are observed most often when drawing architecture. In contrast, natural scenes often do not have any sets of parallel lines, the only method to indicate the relative position of elements in the composition was by overlapping, of which much use is made in works like the Parthenon Marbles. Chinese artists made use of perspective from the first or second century until the 18th century. It is not certain how they came to use the technique, some authorities suggest that the Chinese acquired the technique from India, oblique projection is also seen in Japanese art, such as in the Ukiyo-e paintings of Torii Kiyonaga. This was detailed within Aristotles Poetics as skenographia, using flat panels on a stage to give the illusion of depth, the philosophers Anaxagoras and Democritus worked out geometric theories of perspective for use with skenographia. Alcibiades had paintings in his house designed using skenographia, so this art was not confined merely to the stage, Euclids Optics introduced a mathematical theory of perspective, but there is some debate over the extent to which Euclids perspective coincides with the modern mathematical definition
7.
Uki-e
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Uki-e refers to a genre of ukiyo-e pictures that employs western conventions of linear perspective. Around 1739, Okumura Masanobu studied European engravings to learn the rules of perspective and his engravings found their way to Japan either through Dejima or China. Toyoharu was also the first to adapt these techniques to Japanese subjects, the interior of Kabuki theaters was a common subject in Uki-e prints. Interior scenes tend to be favored as it is easier to apply one point perspective to architecture than to landscape. Réunion des musées nationaux, ed. Images du Monde flottant, public Spectacles, Personal Pleasures, four centuries of Japanese prints from a Cincinnati collection. Dictionnaire historique du Japon, Volume 2, media related to Uki-e at Wikimedia Commons Short article about the genre
8.
Okumura Masanobu
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Okumura Masanobu was a Japanese print designer, book publisher, and painter. He also illustrated novelettes and in his early years wrote some fiction, at first his work adhered to the Torii school, but later drifted beyond that. He is a figure in the era of ukiyo-e doing early works on actors. While Masanobus early life is undocumented, he is believed to have been born about 1686. Masanobu appears to have been self-taught, he is not known to have belonged to any artistic school, a print album published by Kurihara Chōemon in 1701 depicting coutesans in the Yoshiwara pleasure district is Masanobus earliest surviving signed work, followed by a similar work ten months later. Moronobu provided the illustrations, and sometimes text, for at least twenty-two ukiyo-zōshi novels and these included a modernized illustrated version of the 11th-century Tale of Genji in eighteen volumes, whose translation was by Masanobu. These prints, influenced perhaps by 12th-century Toba-e and the paintings of Hanabusa Itchō, depicted humorous scenes from, or parodies of, Noh, kabuki. This period also saw Masanobu produce large kakemono-sized portraits of courtesans, whose designs had a warmth and humanity largely absent from the earlier Torii and Kaigetsudō beauties. At least as early as 1718, Masanobus were some of the earliest urushi-e prints, printed with brass powder sprinkled on the ink, about 1721 Masanobu abandoned the publishers of his earlier works and opened his own wholesaler, Okumura-ya, in Tōri Shio-chō in Edo. His trade mark was a sign, a mark he thereafter stamped on the works he printed. It is likely that Masanobu died at 78 in 1764,1769 has also given as his death date. Okumura Masanobu is said to be master of the Urushi-e style, Urushi-e is usually done on woodblocks and has thick black lines. All of these works have dark, thick lines and are made on woodblocks and his works are also famous for his gentile and flowing lines he uses throughout his drawings. He also has a pattern throughout his works consisting of tan backgrounds. His pieces capture things and or people in motion and his objects in the drawings are always in mid motion of walking somewhere or doing something, definitely not pictures of still drawings. Masanobu was also famous for capturing the beauty of nature and he would paint/draw, birds, women, men, actors, and warriors. The style of the Japanese women he draws in his pieces all have the same style, the face is showing, however, the bodies are covered up by long flowing dresses. This style is referred to as Tan-e, which means he draws women as full bodied, the tan-e style brings a sense of gentleness to the beauties and gracefulness
9.
Ukiyo-e
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The ukiyo-e genre of art flourished in Japan from the 17th through 19th centuries. The term ukiyo-e translates as picture of the floating world, Edo became the seat of government for the military dictatorship in the early 17th century. The merchant class at the bottom of the social order benefitted most from the rapid economic growth. Many indulged in the entertainments of kabuki theatre, courtesans, the term ukiyo came to describe this hedonistic lifestyle. The earliest success was in the 1670s with Moronobus paintings and monochromatic prints of beautiful women, colour in prints came gradually—at first added by hand for special commissions. By the 1740s, artists such as Masanobu used multiple woodblocks to print areas of colour, from the 1760s the success of Harunobus brocade prints led to full-colour production becoming standard, each print made with numerous blocks. Specialists have prized the portraits of beauties and actors by masters such as Kiyonaga, Utamaro, Following the deaths of these two masters, and against the technological and social modernization that followed the Meiji Restoration of 1868, ukiyo-e production went into steep decline. Some ukiyo-e artists specialized in making paintings, but most works were prints, as printing was done by hand, printers were able to achieve effects impractical with machines, such as the blending or gradation of colours on the printing block. Ukiyo-e was central to forming the Wests perception of Japanese art in the late 19th century–especially the landscapes of Hokusai, Prints since the late 20th century have continued in an individualist vein, often made with techniques imported from the West. The Kanō school of painting incorporated features of both, since antiquity, Japanese art had found patrons in the aristocracy, military governments, and religious authorities. Later works appeared by and for townspeople, including inexpensive monochromatic paintings of female beauties and scenes of the theatre and pleasure districts, the hand-produced nature of these shikomi-e limited the scale of their production, a limit that was soon overcome by genres that turned to mass-produced woodblock printing. During a prolonged period of war in the 16th century. In the early 17th century Tokugawa Ieyasu unified the country and was appointed Shogun with supreme power over Japan and he consolidated his government in the village of Edo, and required the territorial lords to assemble there in alternate years with their entourages. The demands of the growing capital drew many male labourers from the country, the village grew during the Edo period from a population of 1800 to over a million in the 19th century. The centralized shogunate put an end to the power of the machishū and divided the population into four classes, with the ruling samurai class at the top. The experience of the quarters was open to those of sufficient wealth, manners. Woodblock printing in Japan traces back to the Hyakumantō Darani in 770 CE, until the 17th century such printing was reserved for Buddhist seals and images. Movable type appeared around 1600, but as the Japanese writing system required about 100,000 type pieces, in Saga Domain, calligrapher Honami Kōetsu and publisher Suminokura Soan combined printed text and images in an adaptation of The Tales of Ise and other works of literature
10.
Woodblock printing
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Woodblock printing is a technique for printing text, images or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later paper. Ukiyo-e is the best known type of Japanese woodblock art print, most European uses of the technique for printing images on paper are covered by the art term woodcut, except for the block-books produced mainly in the 15th century. Prior to the invention of printing, seals and stamps were used for making impressions. The oldest of these came from Mesopotamia and Egypt. A few much larger brick stamps for marking clay bricks survive from Akkad from around 2270 BC. There are also Roman lead pipe inscriptions of some length that were stamped, however none of these used ink, which is necessary for printing, but stamped marks into relatively soft materials. In both China and Egypt, the use of stamps for seals preceded the use of larger blocks. In Europe and India, the printing of cloth certainly preceded the printing of paper or papyrus, the process is essentially the same—in Europe special presentation impressions of prints were often printed on silk until at least the 17th century. The block was cut along the grain of the wood and it is necessary only to ink the block and bring it into firm and even contact with the paper or cloth to achieve an acceptable print. The content would of course print in reverse or mirror-image, a further complication when text was involved, the art of carving the woodcut is technically known as xylography, though the term is rarely used in English. For colour printing, multiple blocks are used, each for one colour, multiple colours can be printed by keying the paper to a frame around the woodblocks. There are three methods of printing to consider, Stamping Used for many fabrics, and most early European woodcuts. These items were printed by putting paper or fabric on a table or a surface with the block on top, and pressing, or hammering. Rubbing Apparently the most common for Far Eastern printing, Used for European woodcuts and block-books later in the 15th century, and very widely for cloth. The block is placed face side up on a table, with the paper or fabric on top, the back of the paper or fabric is rubbed with a hard pad, a flat piece of wood, a burnisher, or a leather frotton. Printing in a press Presses only seem to have used in Asia in relatively recent times. Simple weighted presses may have used in Europe, but firm evidence is lacking. A deceased Abbess of Mechelen in Flanders in 1465 had unum instrumentum ad imprintendum scripturas et ymagines, cum 14 aliis lapideis printis which is probably too early to be a Gutenberg-type printing press in that location
11.
Movable type
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Movable type is the system and technology of printing and typography that uses movable components to reproduce the elements of a document usually on the medium of paper. In 1377, currently the oldest extant movable metal print book, the diffusion of both movable-type systems was, however, limited. Around 1450 Johannes Gutenberg made another version of a metal printing press in Europe, along with innovations in casting the type based on a matrix. The more limited number of characters needed for European languages was an important factor, Gutenberg was the first to create his type pieces from an alloy of lead, tin, and antimony—and these materials remained standard for 550 years. For alphabetic scripts, movable-type page setting was quicker than woodblock printing, the metal type pieces were more durable and the lettering was more uniform, leading to typography and fonts. The high quality and relatively low price of the Gutenberg Bible established the superiority of movable type in Europe, the printing press may be regarded as one of the key factors fostering the Renaissance and due to its effectiveness, its use spread around the globe. The 19th-century invention of hot metal typesetting and its successors caused movable type to decline in the 20th century, the technique of imprinting multiple copies of symbols or glyphs with a master type punch made of hard metal first developed around 3000 BC in ancient Sumer. These metal punch types can be seen as precursors of the letter punches adapted in later millennia to printing with metal type. Cylinder seals were used in Mesopotamia to create an impression on a surface by rolling the seal on wet clay and they were used to sign documents and mark objects as the owners property. By 650 BC the ancient Greeks were using larger diameter punches to imprint small page images onto coins and tokens, seals and stamps may have been precursors to movable type. A few authors even view the disc as technically meeting all definitional criteria to represent an early incidence of movable-type printing, recently it has been alleged by Jerome Eisenberg that the disk is a forgery. The Prüfening dedicatory inscription is medieval example of movable type stamps being used, yet copying books by hand was still labour-consuming. Not until the Xiping Era, towards the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty did sealing print and it was soon used for printing designs on fabrics, and later for printing texts. Woodblock printing, invented by about the 8th century during the Tang Dynasty, then carvers cut away the parts of the board that were not part of the character, so that the characters were cut in relief, completely differently from those cut intaglio. When printing, the characters would have some ink spread on them. With workers’ hands moving on the back of paper gently, characters would be printed on the paper, by the Song Dynasty, woodblock printing came to its heyday. Although woodblock printing played a role in spreading culture, there remained some apparent drawbacks. Firstly, carving the printing plate required considerable time, labour and materials, secondly, it was not convenient to store these plates, with woodblock printing, one printing plate could be used for tens of hundreds of books, playing a magnificent role in spreading culture
12.
Edo period
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The Edo period or Tokugawa period is the period between 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when Japanese society was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the countrys 300 regional daimyō. The period was characterized by growth, strict social order, isolationist foreign policies. The shogunate was established in Edo on March 24,1603. The period came to an end with the Meiji Restoration on May 3,1868, instrumental in the rise of the new bakufu was Tokugawa Ieyasu, the main beneficiary of the achievements of Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Already powerful, Ieyasu profited by his transfer to the rich Kantō area, after Hideyoshis death, Ieyasu moved quickly to seize control from the Toyotomi family. Ieyasus victory over the western daimyōs at the Battle of Sekigahara gave him control of all Japan. He rapidly abolished numerous enemy daimyō houses, reduced others, such as that of the Toyotomi, Ieyasu still failed to achieve complete control of the western daimyōs, but his assumption of the title of shogun helped consolidate the alliance system. After further strengthening his base, Ieyasu installed his son Hidetada as shogun. The Toyotomi were still a significant threat, and Ieyasu devoted the next decade to their eradication, in 1615, the Tokugawa army destroyed the Toyotomi stronghold at Osaka. The Tokugawa period brought 250 years of stability to Japan, the political system evolved into what historians call bakuhan, a combination of the terms bakufu and han to describe the government and society of the period. In the bakuhan, the shogun had national authority and the daimyōs had regional authority and this represented a new unity in the feudal structure, which featured an increasingly large bureaucracy to administer the mixture of centralized and decentralized authorities. The feudal hierarchy was completed by the classes of daimyō. Closest to the Tokugawa house were the shinpan, or related houses and they were twenty-three daimyōs on the borders of Tokugawa lands, all directly related to Ieyasu. The shinpan held mostly honorary titles and advisory posts in the bakufu, the second class of the hierarchy were the fudai, or house daimyōs, rewarded with lands close to the Tokugawa holdings for their faithful service. By the 18th century,145 fudai controlled such smaller han, members of the fudai class staffed most of the major bakufu offices. Ninety-seven han formed the group, the tozama, former opponents or new allies. The tozama were located mostly on the peripheries of the archipelago, because the tozama were least trusted of the daimyō, they were the most cautiously managed and generously treated, although they were excluded from central government positions. The Tokugawa not only consolidated their control over a reunified Japan, they also had unprecedented power over the emperor, the court, all daimyōs and the religious orders
13.
Woodcut
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Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that the artist cuts away carry no ink, while characters or images at surface level carry the ink to produce the print, the block is cut along the wood grain. The surface is covered with ink by rolling over the surface with a roller, leaving ink upon the flat surface. Multiple colors can be printed by keying the paper to a frame around the woodblocks, single-leaf woodcut is a term for a woodcut presented as a single image or print, as opposed to a book illustration. Among these the best known are the 16th century Hieronymus Andreae, Hans Lützelburger and Jost de Negker, all of whom ran workshops, the formschneider in turn handed the block on to specialist printers. There were further specialists who made the blank blocks and this is why woodcuts are sometimes described by museums or books as designed by rather than by an artist, but most authorities do not use this distinction. The division of labour had the advantage that a trained artist could adapt to the medium relatively easily, there were various methods of transferring the artists drawn design onto the block for the cutter to follow. Either the drawing would be made directly onto the block, or a drawing on paper was glued to the block, either way, the artists drawing was destroyed during the cutting process. Other methods were used, including tracing, in both Europe and the Far East in the early 20th century, some artists began to do the whole process themselves. In Japan, this movement was called sōsaku-hanga, as opposed to shin-hanga, in the West, many artists used the easier technique of linocut instead. Compared to intaglio techniques like etching and engraving, only low pressure is required to print, as a relief method, it is only necessary to ink the block and bring it into firm and even contact with the paper or cloth to achieve an acceptable print. In Europe a variety of woods including boxwood and several nut and fruit woods like pear or cherry were commonly used, in Japan, there are three methods of printing to consider, Stamping, Used for many fabrics and most early European woodcuts. Used for European woodcuts and block-books later in the fifteenth century, also used for many Western woodcuts from about 1910 to the present. The block goes face up on a table, with the paper or fabric on top, the back is rubbed with a hard pad, a flat piece of wood, a burnisher, or a leather frotton. A traditional Japanese tool used for this is called a baren, later in Japan, complex wooden mechanisms were used to help hold the woodblock perfectly still and to apply proper pressure in the printing process. This was especially helpful once multiple colors were introduced and had to be applied with precision atop previous ink layers, printing in a press, presses only seem to have been used in Asia in relatively recent times. Printing-presses were used from about 1480 for European prints and block-books, simple weighted presses may have been used in Europe before the print-press, but firm evidence is lacking
14.
Printmaking
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Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Printmaking normally covers only the process of creating prints that have an element of originality, except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable of producing multiples of the same piece, which is called a print. Each print produced is not considered a copy but rather is considered an original, a print may be known as an impression. Printmaking is not chosen only for its ability to multiple impressions. Prints are created by transferring ink from a matrix or through a screen to a sheet of paper or other material. Screens made of silk or synthetic fabrics are used for the screenprinting process, other types of matrix substrates and related processes are discussed below. Multiple impressions printed from the matrix form an edition. Prints may also be printed in book form, such as illustrated books or artists books, Printmaking techniques are generally divided into the following basic categories, Relief, where ink is applied to the original surface of the matrix. Relief techniques include woodcut or woodblock as the Asian forms are known, wood engraving. Intaglio, where ink is applied beneath the surface of the matrix. Intaglio techniques include engraving, etching, mezzotint, aquatint, planographic, where the matrix retains its original surface, but is specially prepared and/or inked to allow for the transfer of the image. Planographic techniques include lithography, monotyping, and digital techniques, stencil, where ink or paint is pressed through a prepared screen, including screenprinting and pochoir. Other types of printmaking techniques outside these groups include collagraphy and viscosity printing, collagraphy is a printmaking technique in which textured material is adhered to the printing matrix. This texture is transferred to the paper during the printing process, Contemporary printmaking may include digital printing, photographic mediums, or a combination of digital, photographic, and traditional processes. Many of these techniques can also be combined, especially within the same family, for example, Rembrandts prints are usually referred to as etchings for convenience, but very often include work in engraving and drypoint as well, and sometimes have no etching at all. Woodcut, a type of print, is the earliest printmaking technique. It was probably first developed as a means of printing patterns on cloth, woodcuts of images on paper developed around 1400 in Japan, and slightly later in Europe. These are the two areas where woodcut has been most extensively used purely as a process for making images without text, the artist draws a design on a plank of wood, or on paper which is transferred to the wood
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Buddhism
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Buddhism is a religion and dharma that encompasses a variety of traditions, beliefs and spiritual practices largely based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. Buddhism originated in India sometime between the 6th and 4th centuries BCE, from where it spread through much of Asia, two major extant branches of Buddhism are generally recognized by scholars, Theravada and Mahayana. Buddhism is the worlds fourth-largest religion, with over 500 million followers or 7% of the global population, Buddhist schools vary on the exact nature of the path to liberation, the importance and canonicity of various teachings and scriptures, and especially their respective practices. In Theravada the ultimate goal is the attainment of the state of Nirvana, achieved by practicing the Noble Eightfold Path, thus escaping what is seen as a cycle of suffering. Theravada has a following in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia. Mahayana, which includes the traditions of Pure Land, Zen, Nichiren Buddhism, Shingon, rather than Nirvana, Mahayana instead aspires to Buddhahood via the bodhisattva path, a state wherein one remains in the cycle of rebirth to help other beings reach awakening. Vajrayana, a body of teachings attributed to Indian siddhas, may be viewed as a branch or merely a part of Mahayana. Tibetan Buddhism, which preserves the Vajrayana teachings of eighth century India, is practiced in regions surrounding the Himalayas, Tibetan Buddhism aspires to Buddhahood or rainbow body. Buddhism is an Indian religion attributed to the teachings of Buddha, the details of Buddhas life are mentioned in many early Buddhist texts but are inconsistent, his social background and life details are difficult to prove, the precise dates uncertain. Some hagiographic legends state that his father was a king named Suddhodana, his mother queen Maya, and he was born in Lumbini gardens. Some of the stories about Buddha, his life, his teachings, Buddha was moved by the innate suffering of humanity. He meditated on this alone for a period of time, in various ways including asceticism, on the nature of suffering. He famously sat in meditation under a Ficus religiosa tree now called the Bodhi Tree in the town of Bodh Gaya in Gangetic plains region of South Asia. He reached enlightenment, discovering what Buddhists call the Middle Way, as an enlightened being, he attracted followers and founded a Sangha. Now, as the Buddha, he spent the rest of his teaching the Dharma he had discovered. Dukkha is a concept of Buddhism and part of its Four Noble Truths doctrine. It can be translated as incapable of satisfying, the unsatisfactory nature, the Four Truths express the basic orientation of Buddhism, we crave and cling to impermanent states and things, which is dukkha, incapable of satisfying and painful. This keeps us caught in saṃsāra, the cycle of repeated rebirth, dukkha
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Heian period
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The Heian period is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. The period is named after the city of Heian-kyō, or modern Kyōto. It is the period in Japanese history when Buddhism, Taoism, the Heian period is also considered the peak of the Japanese imperial court and noted for its art, especially poetry and literature. Although the Imperial House of Japan had power on the surface, the power was in the hands of the Fujiwara clan. Many emperors actually had mothers from the Fujiwara family, the Heian period was preceded by the Nara period and began in 794 A. D. after the movement of the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō, by the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu. Kanmu first tried to move the capital to Nagaoka-kyō, but a series of disasters befell the city, prompting the emperor to relocate the capital a second time, a rebellion occurred in China in the last years of the 9th century, making the political situation unstable. The Japanese missions to Tang China was suspended and the influx of Chinese exports halted, therefore the Heian Period is considered a high point in Japanese culture that later generations have always admired. The period is noted for the rise of the samurai class. Nominally, sovereignty lay in the emperor but in power was wielded by the Fujiwara nobility. However, to protect their interests in the provinces, the Fujiwara and other noble families required guards, police, the warrior class made steady political gains throughout the Heian period. Still, a military takeover of the Japanese government was centuries away. The entry of the class into court influence was a result of the Hōgen Rebellion. At this time Taira no Kiyomori revived the Fujiwara practices by placing his grandson on the throne to rule Japan by regency and their clan, the Taira, would not be overthrown until after the Genpei War, which marked the start of the shogunate. The Kamakura period began in 1185 when Minamoto no Yoritomo seized power from the emperors, Nara was abandoned after only 70 years in part due to the ascendancy of Dōkyō and the encroaching secular power of the Buddhist institutions there. Kyōto had good access to the sea and could be reached by land routes from the eastern provinces. The early Heian period continued Nara culture, the Heian capital was patterned on the Chinese Tang capital at Changan, as was Nara, Kanmu endeavoured to improve the Tang-style administrative system which was in use. Known as the ritsuryō, this attempted to recreate the Tang imperium in Japan. Despite the decline of the Taika–Taihō reforms, imperial government was vigorous during the early Heian period, Kanmus avoidance of drastic reform decreased the intensity of political struggles, and he became recognized as one of Japans most forceful emperors
17.
Underdrawing
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Underdrawing is a preparatory drawing done on a painting ground before paint is applied, for example, an imprimatura or an underpainting. Underdrawing was used extensively by 15th century painters like Jan van Eyck and these artists underdrew with a brush, using hatching strokes for shading, using water-based black paint, before underpainting and overpainting with oils. Cennino DAndrea Cennini describes a different type of underdrawing, made with graded tones rather than hatching, infrared reflectography and spectroscopic analysis of paintings Drawsketches. How to Draw step by step How to Draw with steps
18.
Society of Jesus
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The Society of Jesus Latin, Societas Iesu, S. J. SJ or SI) is a religious congregation of the Catholic Church which originated in Spain. The society is engaged in evangelization and apostolic ministry in 112 nations on six continents, Jesuits work in education, intellectual research, and cultural pursuits. Jesuits also give retreats, minister in hospitals and parishes, and promote social justice, Ignatius of Loyola founded the society after being wounded in battle and experiencing a religious conversion. He composed the Spiritual Exercises to help others follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, ignatiuss plan of the orders organization was approved by Pope Paul III in 1540 by a bull containing the Formula of the Institute. Ignatius was a nobleman who had a background, and the members of the society were supposed to accept orders anywhere in the world. The Society participated in the Counter-Reformation and, later, in the implementation of the Second Vatican Council, the Society of Jesus is consecrated under the patronage of Madonna Della Strada, a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and it is led by a Superior General. The Society of Jesus on October 3,2016 announced that Superior General Adolfo Nicolás resignation was officially accepted, on October 14, the 36th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus elected Father Arturo Sosa as its thirty-first Superior General. The headquarters of the society, its General Curia, is in Rome, the historic curia of St. Ignatius is now part of the Collegio del Gesù attached to the Church of the Gesù, the Jesuit Mother Church. In 2013, Jorge Mario Bergoglio became the first Jesuit Pope, the Jesuits today form the largest single religious order of priests and brothers in the Catholic Church. As of 1 January 2015, Jesuits numbered 16,740,11,986 clerics regular,2,733 scholastics,1,268 brothers and 753 novices. In 2012, Mark Raper S. J. wrote, Our numbers have been in decline for the last 40 years—from over 30,000 in the 1960s to fewer than 18,000 today. The steep declines in Europe and North America and consistent decline in Latin America have not been offset by the significant increase in South Asia, the Society is divided into 83 Provinces with six Independent Regions and ten Dependent Regions. On 1 January 2007, members served in 112 nations on six continents with the largest number in India and their average age was 57.3 years,63.4 years for priests,29.9 years for scholastics, and 65.5 years for brothers. The current Superior General of the Jesuits is Arturo Sosa, the Society is characterized by its ministries in the fields of missionary work, human rights, social justice and, most notably, higher education. It operates colleges and universities in countries around the world and is particularly active in the Philippines. In the United States it maintains 28 colleges and universities and 58 high schools and he ensured that his formula was contained in two papal bulls signed by Pope Paul III in 1540 and by Pope Julius III in 1550. The formula expressed the nature, spirituality, community life and apostolate of the new religious order, the meeting is now commemorated in the Martyrium of Saint Denis, Montmartre
19.
Printing press
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A printing press is a device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium, thereby transferring the ink. The printing press was invented in the Holy Roman Empire by the German Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the printing press spread within several decades to over two hundred cities in a dozen European countries. By 1500, printing presses in operation throughout Western Europe had already produced more than twenty million volumes, in the 16th century, with presses spreading further afield, their output rose tenfold to an estimated 150 to 200 million copies. The operation of a press became so synonymous with the enterprise of printing that it lent its name to a new branch of media. The sharp rise of learning and literacy amongst the middle class led to an increased demand for books which the time-consuming hand-copying method fell far short of accommodating. Technologies preceding the press led to the presss invention included, manufacturing of paper, development of ink, woodblock printing. At the same time, a number of products and technological processes had reached a level of maturity which allowed their potential use for printing purposes. The device was used from very early on in urban contexts as a cloth press for printing patterns. Gutenberg may have also inspired by the paper presses which had spread through the German lands since the late 14th century. Gutenberg adopted the design, thereby mechanizing the printing process. Printing, however, put a demand on the quite different from pressing. Gutenberg adapted the construction so that the power exerted by the platen on the paper was now applied both evenly and with the required sudden elasticity. To speed up the process, he introduced a movable undertable with a plane surface on which the sheets could be swiftly changed. The known examples range from Germany to England to Italy, however, the various techniques employed did not have the refinement and efficiency needed to become widely accepted. Gutenberg greatly improved the process by treating typesetting and printing as two separate work steps, a goldsmith by profession, he created his type pieces from a lead-based alloy which suited printing purposes so well that it is still used today. The mass production of metal letters was achieved by his key invention of a hand mould. Another factor conducive to printing arose from the existing in the format of the codex. Considered the most important advance in the history of the prior to printing itself
20.
Nagasaki
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Nagasaki is the capital and the largest city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. Part of Nagasaki was home to a major Imperial Japanese Navy base during the First Sino-Japanese War, during World War II, the American atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki made Nagasaki the second and, to date, last city in the world to experience a nuclear attack. As of 1 January 2009, the city has an population of 446,007. The total area is 406.35 km², a small fishing village set in a secluded harbor, Nagasaki had little historical significance until contact with Portuguese explorers in 1543. An early visitor was Fernão Mendes Pinto, who came on a Portuguese ship which landed nearby in Tanegashima and his followers who remained behind converted a number of daimyōs. The most notable among them was Ōmura Sumitada, the little harbor village quickly grew into a diverse port city, and Portuguese products imported through Nagasaki were assimilated into popular Japanese culture. The Portuguese also brought them many goods from China. Thus, for a period after 1580, the city of Nagasaki was a Jesuit colony, under their administrative. It was administered by the captain of the Portuguese black ship, the highest representative of the Portuguese Crown and it became a refuge for Christians escaping maltreatment in other regions of Japan. In 1587, however, Toyotomi Hideyoshis campaign to unify the country arrived in Kyūshū, however, the expulsion order went largely unenforced, and the fact remained that most of Nagasakis population remained openly practicing Catholic. In 1596, the Spanish ship San Felipe was wrecked off the coast of Shikoku, in response, Hideyoshi ordered the crucifixions of twenty-six Catholics in Nagasaki on February 5 of that year. Portuguese traders were not ostracized, however, and so the city continued to thrive, in 1602, Augustinian missionaries also arrived in Japan, and when Tokugawa Ieyasu took power in 1603, Catholicism was still tolerated. Many Catholic daimyōs had been allies at the Battle of Sekigahara. Once Osaka Castle had been taken and Toyotomi Hideyoshis offspring killed, though, in addition, the Dutch and English presence allowed trade without religious strings attached. Thus, in 1614, Catholicism was officially banned and all missionaries ordered to leave, most Catholic daimyo apostatized, and forced their subjects to do so, although a few would not renounce the religion and left the country for Macau, Luzon and Japantowns in Southeast Asia. A brutal campaign of persecution followed, with thousands of converts across Kyūshū and other parts of Japan killed, tortured, catholicisms last gasp as an open religion and the last major military action in Japan until the Meiji Restoration was the Shimabara Rebellion of 1637. Consequently, in Tokugawa society the word Shimabara solidified the connection between Christianity and disloyalty, constantly used again and again in Tokugawa propaganda, the Shimabara Rebellion also convinced many policy-makers that foreign influences were more trouble than they were worth, leading to the national isolation policy. The Great Fire of Nagasaki destroyed much of the city in 1663, including the Mazu shrine at the Kofukuji Temple patronized by the Chinese sailors, in 1720 the ban on Dutch books was lifted, causing hundreds of scholars to flood into Nagasaki to study European science and art
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Toyotomi Hideyoshi
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Toyotomi Hideyoshi was a preeminent daimyō, warrior, general, samurai, and politician of the Sengoku period who is regarded as Japans second great unifier. He succeeded his former lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Warring States period. The period of his rule is called the Momoyama period. After his death, his young son Hideyori was displaced by Tokugawa Ieyasu, Hideyoshi is noted for a number of cultural legacies, including the restriction that only members of the samurai class could bear arms. He financed the construction, restoration and rebuilding of many temples standing today in Kyoto, Hideyoshi played an important role in the history of Christianity in Japan when he ordered the execution by crucifixion of twenty-six Christians. Very little is known for certain about Hideyoshi before 1570, when he begins to appear in surviving documents and his autobiography starts in 1577 but in it Hideyoshi spoke very little about his past. According to tradition, he was born in Owari Province, the home of the Oda clan and he was born of no traceable samurai lineage, being the son of a peasant-ashigaru named Yaemon. He had no surname, and his given name was Hiyoshi-maru although variations exist. Many legends describe Hideyoshi being sent to study at a temple as a young man, under the name Kinoshita Tōkichirō, he first joined the Imagawa clan as a servant to a local ruler named Matsushita Yukitsuna. He traveled all the way to the lands of Imagawa Yoshimoto, daimyō of Suruga Province, in 1558 he joined the Oda clan, now headed by Oda Nobunaga, as an ashigaru. According to his biographers, he supervised the repair of Kiyosu Castle, a described as apocryphal. In 1561, Hideyoshi married One who was Asano Nagakatsus adopted daughter and he carried out repairs on Sunomata Castle with his younger brother Toyotomi Hidenaga and the bandits Hachisuka Masakatsu and Maeno Nagayasu. Hideyoshis efforts were well received because Sunomata was in enemy territory and he constructed a fort in Sunomata, according to legend overnight, and discovered a secret route into Mount Inaba after which much of the garrison surrendered. Hideyoshi was very successful as a negotiator, in 1564, he managed to convince, mostly with liberal bribes, a number of Mino warlords to desert the Saitō clan. Hideyoshi approached many Saitō clan samurai and convinced them to submit to Nobunaga, including the Saitō clans strategist, the new surname included two characters, one each from Odas two other right-hand men, Niwa Nagahide and Shibata Katsuie. Hideyoshi led troops in the Battle of Anegawa in 1570 in which Oda Nobunaga allied with Tokugawa Ieyasu to lay siege to two fortresses of the Azai and Asakura clans and he participated in the 1573 Siege of Nagashima. In 1573, after victorious campaigns against the Azai and Asakura, initially based at the former Azai headquarters in Odani, Hideyoshi moved to Kunitomo, and renamed the city Nagahama in tribute to Nobunaga. Hideyoshi later moved to the port at Imahama on Lake Biwa, from there he began work on Imahama Castle and took control of the nearby Kunitomo firearms factory that had been established some years previously by the Azai and Asakura
22.
Korea
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Korea is a historical state in East Asia, since 1945 divided into two distinct sovereign states, North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by China to the northwest and it is separated from Japan to the east by the Korea Strait and the Sea of Japan. Korea emerged as a political entity after centuries of conflict among the Three Kingdoms of Korea. Later Silla divided into three states during the Later Three Kingdoms period. Goryeo, which had succeeded Goguryeo, defeated the two states and united the Korean Peninsula. Around the same time, Balhae collapsed and its last crown prince fled south to Goryeo, Goryeo, whose name developed into the modern exonym Korea, was a highly cultured state that created the worlds first metal movable type in 1234. However, multiple invasions by the Mongol Yuan Dynasty during the 13th century greatly weakened the nation, following the Yuan Dynastys collapse, severe political strife followed, and Goryeo eventually fell to a coup led by General Yi Seong-gye, who established Joseon in 1388. The first 200 years of Joseon were marked by peace and saw the creation of the Korean alphabet by Sejong the Great in the 14th century. During the later part of the dynasty, however, Koreas isolationist policy earned it the Western nickname of the Hermit Kingdom, by the late 19th century, the country became the object of imperial design by the Empire of Japan. Despite attempts at modernization by the Korean Empire, in 1910 Korea was annexed by Japan and these circumstances soon became the basis for the division of Korea by the two superpowers, exacerbated by their incapability to agree on the terms of Korean independence. To date, both continue to compete with each other as the sole legitimate government of all of Korea. Korea is the spelling of Corea, a name attested in English as early as 1614. It is a derived from Cauli, Marco Polos transcription of the Chinese 高麗. This was the Hanja for the Korean kingdom of Goryeo or Koryŏ, Goryeos name was a continuation of the earlier Goguryeo or Koguryŏ, the northernmost of the Samguk, which was officially known by the shortened form Goryeo after the 5th-century reign of King Jangsu. The original name was a combination of the go with the name of a local Yemaek tribe. The name Korea is now used in English contexts by both North and South Korea. In South Korea, Korea as a whole is referred to as Hanguk, the name references the Samhan—Ma, Jin, and Byeon—who preceded the Three Kingdoms in the southern and central end of the peninsula during the 1st centuries BC and AD. It has been linked with the title khan used by the nomads of Manchuria
23.
Tokugawa Ieyasu
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Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan, which effectively ruled Japan from the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605 and his given name is sometimes spelled Iyeyasu, according to the historical pronunciation of he. Ieyasu was posthumously enshrined at Nikkō Tōshō-gū with the name Tōshō Daigongen and he was one of the three unifiers of Japan, along with his Former Lord Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Tokugawa Ieyasu was born in Okazaki Castle in Mikawa on the 26th day of the month of the eleventh year of Tenbun. His mother and father were step-siblings and they were just 17 and 15 years old, respectively, when Ieyasu was born. Two years later, Odai-no-kata was sent back to her family, as both husband and wife remarried and both went on to have further children, Ieyasu in the end had 11 half-brothers and sisters. The Matsudaira family was split in 1550, one wanted to be vassals of the Imagawa clan. As a result, much of Ieyasus early years were spent in danger as wars with the Oda and this family feud was the reason behind the murder of Ieyasus paternal grandfather, Matsudaira Kiyoyasu. Unlike his father and the majority of his branch of the family, Ieyasus father, Hirotada, in 1548, when the Oda clan invaded Mikawa, Hirotada turned to Imagawa Yoshimoto, the head of the Imagawa clan, for help to repel the invaders. Yoshimoto agreed under the condition that Hirotada send Ieyasu to Sunpu as a hostage, Oda Nobuhide, the leader of the Oda clan, learned of this arrangement and had Ieyasu abducted from his entourage en route to Sunpu. Ieyasu was just five years old at the time, Nobuhide threatened to execute Ieyasu unless his father severed all ties with the Imagawa clan. Hirotada replied that sacrificing his own son would show his seriousness in his pact with the Imagawa clan, despite this refusal, Nobuhide chose not to kill Ieyasu, but instead held him for the next three years at the Mansho Temple in Nagoya. In 1549, when Ieyasu was 6, his father Hirotada was murdered by his own treacherous vassals, at about the same time, Oda Nobuhide died during an epidemic. Nobuhides death dealt a blow to the Oda clan. An army under the command of Imagawa Sessai laid siege to the castle where Oda Nobuhiro, Nobuhides eldest son, with the castle about to fall, Sessai offered a deal to Oda Nobunaga, Nobuhides second son. Sessai offered to give up the siege if Ieyasu was handed over to the Imagawa, Nobunaga agreed, and so Ieyasu was taken as a hostage to Sunpu. Here he lived a good life as hostage and potentially useful future ally of the Imagawa clan until 1556 when he was age 13 years old. In 1556 he came of age, and, following tradition, one year later, at the age of 13, he married his first wife, Lady Tsukiyama, and changed his name again to Matsudaira Kurandonosuke Motoyasu
24.
Toyotomi Hideyori
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Toyotomi Hideyori was the son and designated successor of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the general who first united all of Japan. His mother, Yodo-dono, was the niece of Oda Nobunaga, when Hideyoshi died in 1598, the five regents he had appointed to rule in Hideyoris place began jockeying amongst themselves for power. Tokugawa Ieyasu seized control in 1600, after his victory over the others at the Battle of Sekigahara, Hideyoris arranged marriage to Senhime, the seven-year-old granddaughter of Ieyasu, was designed to mitigate Toyotomi clan dissension and plotting. In this period, the boy practiced calligraphy with phrases wishing for peace throughout the world. However, Ieyasu continued to view the young Hideyori as a potential threat, Tokugawa forces attacked Hideyori in the Siege of Osaka in the winter of 1614. The attack failed, but Hideyori was induced to sign a truce, in April 1615, Ieyasu received word that Toyotomi Hideyori was gathering even more troops than in the previous November, and that he was trying to stop the filling of the moat of Osaka Castle. Toyotomi forces began to attack contingents of the Shoguns forces near Osaka, there was no time to set up a proper defense of the castle, and it was soon set ablaze and pummeled by artillery fire. Hideyori and his mother committed seppuku, and the final major uprising against Tokugawa rule for another 250 or so years was put to an end and his widow remarried but later became a Buddhist nun. Recognizing that they had a numerical disadvantage, they decided to attempt a tactic of inducing surprise. When the confusion was to be at its height, Hideyori would have marched out of Osaka castle with his home troops and would in theory be the final blow to the Tokugawa. What happened, according to Murdoch, was that Akashi was not able to get behind the Tokugawa troops, having been discovered and engaged before he emerged from the lanes. Whats more, the plans fell apart as Moris Ronin, ever eager to fight, began shooting at the Tokugawa ranks, Sanada at once told the ronin to stop but they only doubled their efforts. Mori Katsunaga, deciding to take advantage of his ronins eagerness, upon this, Sanada realized in order to keep any structure of his original plan, he too, would need to engage alongside the ronin. Hideyori began moving with his troops to leave Osaka, meanwhile, the Osaka troops had been doing quite well in spite of the numerical disadvantage. Not only did the Jesuits write this, but, in another account, ono Harunagas son entered the castle and immediately dispatched a letter from Tokugawa to his father. The letter said Do not let Hideyori leave the castle, in the castle is a conspiracy and as soon as Hideyori leaves it he will be attacked from the rear. It is because of this letter, according to Siebold, that Hideyoris portion of the plan miscarried and he was just about to leave when he was brought word of its contents, and at this point, stalled in entering the fray. Eventually, despite the ferocity and initial victories of the Osaka troops, let Hideyori defend the castle to the last, when it fell, it would be time to take a decision
25.
Confucius
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Confucius was a Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher of the Spring and Autumn period of Chinese history. The philosophy of Confucius emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and his followers competed successfully with many other schools during the Hundred Schools of Thought era only to be suppressed in favor of the Legalists during the Qin Dynasty. Following the victory of Han over Chu after the collapse of Qin, aphorisms concerning his teachings were compiled in the Analects, but only many years after his death. Confuciuss principles had a basis in common Chinese tradition and belief and he championed strong family loyalty, ancestor veneration, and respect of elders by their children and of husbands by their wives. He also recommended family as a basis for ideal government and he espoused the well-known principle Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself, the Golden Rule. Confucius is also a deity in Daoism. According to tradition, three generations before Confucius time, his ancestors had migrated from the Song state to the Lu state, Confucius was a descendant of the Shang dynasty Kings through the Dukes of Song. Confucius family and personal name respectively was Kong Qiu, in Chinese, he is most often known as Kongzi. He is also known by the honorific Kong Fuzi, in the Wade–Giles system of romanization, the honorific name is rendered as Kung Fu-tzu. The Latinized name Confucius is derived from Kong Fuzi, and was first coined by 16th-century Jesuit missionaries to China, within the Analects, he is often referred to simply as the Master. In 1 AD, Confucius was given his first posthumous name, in 1530, he was declared the Extremely Sage Departed Teacher. He is also known separately as the Great Sage, First Teacher and it is generally thought that Confucius was born on September 28,551 BC. His birthplace was in Zou, Lu state and his father Kong He, also known as Shuliang He, was an officer in the Lu military. Kong died when Confucius was three years old, and Confucius was raised by his mother Yan Zhengzai in poverty and his mother would later die at less than 40 years of age. At age 19 he married his wife Qiguan, and a year later the couple had their first child, Qiguan and Confucius would later have two daughters together, one of whom is thought to have died early in her life as a child. Confucius was educated at schools for commoners, where he studied and learned the Six Arts, Confucius was born into the class of shi, between the aristocracy and the common people. When his mother died, Confucius is said to have mourned for three years, as was the tradition, the Lu state was headed by a ruling ducal house. Under the duke were three families, whose heads bore the title of viscount and held hereditary positions in the Lu bureaucracy
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Analects
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It is believed to have been written during the Warring States period, and it achieved its final form during the mid-Han dynasty. During the late Song dynasty the importance of the Analects as a work was raised above that of the older Five Classics. They were very important for Confucianism and Chinas overall morals, Confucius believed that the welfare of a country depended on the moral cultivation of its people, beginning from the nations leadership. He believed that individuals could begin to cultivate a sense of virtue through ren. He taught that a sense of virtue was his primary prerequisite for leadership. His primary goal in educating his students was to produce ethically well-cultivated men who would carry themselves with gravity, speak correctly, the work is therefore titled Lunyu meaning edited conversations or selected speeches. The view however was challenged by Qing dynasty philologist Cui Shu who argued on linguistic ground that the last five books are later than the rest of the work. Many modern scholars now believe that the work was compiled over a period of two hundred years, with some questioning the authenticity of some of the sayings. A Han dynasty writer Wang Chong however claimed that the Analects that existed during the Han dynasty was incomplete, at least three times the amount of those do not exist in the Analects at all. According to the Han dynasty scholar Liu Xiang, there were two versions of the Analects that existed at the beginning of the Han dynasty, the Lu version and the Qi version. The Lu version contained twenty chapters, and the Qi version contained twenty-two chapters, of the twenty chapters that both versions had in common, the Lu version had more passages. Each version had its own masters, schools, and transmitters, the old text version got its name because it was written in characters not used since the earlier Warring States period, when it was assumed to have been hidden. According to the Han dynasty scholar Huan Tan, the old version had four hundred characters different from the Lu version. Of these twenty-seven differences, the text only agrees with the old text version in two places. This text was recognized by Zhang Yus contemporaries and by subsequent Han scholars as superior to either individual version, the Qi version was lost for about 1800 years but re-found during the excavation of the tomb of Marquis of Haihun that was found 2011. No complete copies of either the Lu version or the old version of the Analects exist today. Archaeologists have since discovered two handwritten copies of the Analects that were written around 50 BC, during the Western Han dynasty and they are known as the Dingzhou Analects, and the Pyongyang Analects, after the location of the tombs in which they were found. The Dingzhou Analects was discovered in 1973, but no transcription of its contents was published until 1997, the Pyongyang Analects was discovered in 1992
27.
Emakimono
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Emakimono, often simply called emaki, is a horizontal, illustrated narrative form created during the 11th to 16th centuries in Japan. Emaki-mono combines both text and pictures, and is drawn, painted, or stamped on a handscroll and they depict battles, romance, religion, folk tales, and stories of the supernatural world. The handscroll and the scroll are the two most common forms of Japanese painting. Handscrolls are painted on paper or silk, backed with paper, the farthest end is fitted with a roller around which the scroll is rolled. When rolled up, the scrolls are secured with a silk cord and can be safely carried, placed on shelves. Handscrolls range in size, averaging 30 centimeters in height and 9 to 12 meters in length, a normal story covers one to three scrolls. Emaki-mono are read by exposing an arms-length of the scroll at a time, from right to left and it was common for there to be a written account of the story being illustrated either at the start of the scroll, or interspersed between the pictures. It is expected that the person viewing the scroll will re-roll the scroll back in its original form, emaki-mono also serve as some of the earliest and greatest examples of the otoko-e and onna-e styles of painting. There are many differences in the two styles, appealing to the aesthetic preferences of the genders. But perhaps most easily noticeable are the differences in subject matter, onna-e, epitomized by the Tale of Genji handscroll, typically deals with court life, particularly the court ladies, and with romantic themes. Otoko-e, on the hand, often recorded historical events. The Siege of the Sanjō Palace, depicted in the painting Night Attack on the Sanjō Palace is an example of this style. The most often discussed example of emaki-mono is the Genji Monogatari Emaki dating from about 1130 and this emaki illustrates Murasaki Shikibus epic The Tale of Genji. Written about the year 1000, the deals with the life and loves of Genji. While only 15% of the original scrolls remain, the fragments are protected as national treasures, the Chōjū giga is unusual in its own medium, as it does not contain any text, only pictures. It depicts scenes of animals in amusing scenes, analogizing Japanese society in the 12th century
28.
The Tales of Ise
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The Tales of Ise is a Japanese uta monogatari, or collection of waka poems and associated narratives, dating from the Heian period. The current version collects 125 sections, with each combining poems and prose, concerning the exact date of composition and authorship there is only unresolved speculation. The identity of the nameless, idealised central character is unclear, thirty of the poems from The Tales of Ise appear in the Kokin Wakashū, with similar headnotes, all attributed to Narihira. The late-eleventh century work known as The Tale of Sagoromo refers to Ise by the variant name Zaigo Chūjō no Nikki, theories vary as to the identity of the author, with some suggesting Ki no Tsurayuki. Volume 16 of the Manyōshū also has a selection of poems preceded by narratives in classical Chinese. The narrative makes little attempt to link the sections, but introduces or provides a scene for the composition of the poem and this neither produces a traditional biography, nor even a traditional plot, as seen from a Western perspective. The poems themselves explore nature, the society, culture. A highlight can be shown from the interlude in section 9, jay Harris, The Tales of Ise, North Clarendon, Tuttle Publishing,1972. A History of Japanese Literature, Vol.1, Seeds in the Heart — Japanese Literature from Earliest Times to the Late Sixteenth Century, helen Craig McCullough, Tales of Ise, Lyrical Episodes from Tenth-Century Japan, Stanford, Stanford University Press,1968. A transcription of the Tales of Ise from the University of Virginia Library Electronic Text Center, a lacquered writing box by Ogata Korin illustrating the eight bridges section of the tales, the box is a National Treasure of Japan, held in the Tokyo National Museum. Scenes from the Tales of Ise on Edo period screens from The Mary, an illustrated wood-block printed version of the Tales of Ise held in the New York Public Library
29.
Bunraku
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Bunraku, also known as Ningyō jōruri, is a form of traditional Japanese puppet theatre, founded in Osaka in the beginning of 17th century. Three kinds of performers take part in a performance, the Ningyōtsukai or Ningyōzukai. Occasionally other instruments such as taiko drums will be used, the most accurate term for the traditional puppet theater in Japan is ningyō jōruri. The combination of chanting and shamisen playing is called jōruri and the Japanese word for puppet is ningyō and it is used in many plays. Bunraku puppetry has been a traditional activity for Japanese people for hundreds of years. Bunrakus history goes as far back to the turn of the 18th century when Uemura Bunrakuken came to Osaka from Awaji and began his own theatre. The puppets of the Osaka tradition tend to be somewhat smaller overall, the heads and hands of traditional puppets are carved by specialists, while the bodies and costumes are often constructed by puppeteers. The heads can be quite sophisticated mechanically, in plays with supernatural themes, a puppet may be constructed so that its face can quickly transform into that of a demon. Less complex heads may have eyes that move up and down, side to side or close, and noses, mouths, the main puppeteer, the omozukai, uses his or her right hand to control the right hand of the puppet. A third puppeteer, the ashizukai, operates the feet and legs, puppeteers begin their training by operating the feet, then move on to the left hand, before being able to train as the main puppeteer. All but the most minor characters require three puppeteers, who perform in full view of the audience, generally wearing black robes, the shape of the puppeteers hoods also varies, depending on the school to which the puppeteer belongs. Usually a single chanter recites all the parts, altering his vocal pitch. The chanters sit next to the shamisen player, some traditional puppet theaters have revolving platform for the chanter and shamisen player, which rotates bringing replacement musicians for the next scene. The shamisen used in bunraku is slightly larger than other kinds of shamisen and has a different sound, lower in pitch, Bunraku shares many themes with kabuki. In fact, many plays were adapted for both by actors in kabuki and by puppet troupes in bunraku. Bunraku is particularly noted for lovers suicide plays, the story of the forty-seven ronin is also famous in both bunraku and kabuki. Bunraku is a theater, as opposed to kabuki, which is a performers theater. In bunraku, prior to the performance, the chanter holds up the text and bows before it, in kabuki, actors insert puns on their names, ad-libs, references to contemporary happenings and other things which deviate from the script
30.
Copyright
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Copyright is a legal right created by the law of a country that grants the creator of an original work exclusive rights for its use and distribution. This is usually only for a limited time, the exclusive rights are not absolute but limited by limitations and exceptions to copyright law, including fair use. A major limitation on copyright is that copyright protects only the expression of ideas. Copyright is a form of property, applicable to certain forms of creative work. Some, but not all jurisdictions require fixing copyrighted works in a tangible form and it is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders. These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, copyrights are considered territorial rights, which means that they do not extend beyond the territory of a specific jurisdiction. While many aspects of copyright laws have been standardized through international copyright agreements. Typically, the duration of a copyright spans the authors life plus 50 to 100 years, some countries require certain copyright formalities to establishing copyright, but most recognize copyright in any completed work, without formal registration. Generally, copyright is enforced as a matter, though some jurisdictions do apply criminal sanctions. Most jurisdictions recognize copyright limitations, allowing fair exceptions to the exclusivity of copyright. Copyright came about with the invention of the press and with wider literacy. As a legal concept, its origins in Britain were from a reaction to printers monopolies at the beginning of the 18th century, Copyright laws allow products of creative human activities, such as literary and artistic production, to be preferentially exploited and thus incentivized. Different cultural attitudes, social organizations, economic models and legal frameworks are seen to account for why copyright emerged in Europe and not, for example, however, with copyright laws, intellectual production comes to be seen as a product of an individual, with attendant rights. The most significant point is that patent and copyright laws support the expansion of the range of human activities that can be commodified. This parallels the ways in which led to the commodification of many aspects of social life that earlier had no monetary or economic value per se. Often seen as the first real copyright law, the 1709 British Statute of Anne gave the rights for a fixed period. The act also alluded to individual rights of the artist and it began, Whereas Printers, Booksellers, and other Persons, have of late frequently taken the Liberty of Printing. Books, and other Writings, without the Consent of the Authors. to their very great Detriment, and too often to the Ruin of them and their Families
31.
Modern art
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Modern art includes artistic work produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the style and philosophy of the art produced during that era. The term is associated with art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of experimentation. Modern artists experimented with new ways of seeing and with ideas about the nature of materials. A tendency away from the narrative, which was characteristic for the traditional arts, more recent artistic production is often called contemporary art or postmodern art. Matisses two versions of The Dance signified a key point in his career and in the development of modern painting, analytic cubism was jointly developed by Picasso and Georges Braque, exemplified by Violin and Candlestick, Paris, from about 1908 through 1912. Synthetic cubism is characterized by the introduction of different textures, surfaces, collage elements, papier collé, the notion of modern art is closely related to modernism. Although modern sculpture and architecture are reckoned to have emerged at the end of the 19th century, the beginnings of modern painting can be located earlier. The date perhaps most commonly identified as marking the birth of art is 1863. Earlier dates have also proposed, among them 1855 and 1784. In the words of art historian H, harvard Arnason, Each of these dates has significance for the development of modern art, but none categorically marks a completely new beginning. A gradual metamorphosis took place in the course of a hundred years, the strands of thought that eventually led to modern art can be traced back to the Enlightenment, and even to the 17th century. The important modern art critic Clement Greenberg, for instance, called Immanuel Kant the first real Modernist but also drew a distinction, The Enlightenment criticized from the outside. The French Revolution of 1789 uprooted assumptions and institutions that had for centuries been accepted with little question and this gave rise to what art historian Ernst Gombrich called a self-consciousness that made people select the style of their building as one selects the pattern of a wallpaper. The pioneers of art were Romantics, Realists and Impressionists. By the late 19th century, additional movements which were to be influential in art had begun to emerge. The advocates of realism stood against the idealism of the academic art that enjoyed public. The most successful painters of the day worked either through commissions or through public exhibitions of their own work. There were official, government-sponsored painters unions, while governments regularly held exhibitions of new fine
32.
Aizuri-e
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The term aizuri-e usually refers to Japanese woodblock prints that are printed entirely or predominantly in blue. When a second color is used, it is usually red, the development of aizuri-e was associated with the import of the pigment Prussian blue from Europe in the 1820s. This pigment had a number of advantages over the indigo or dayflower petal dyes that were used to create blue. It was more vivid, had greater range and was more resistant to fading. It proved to be effective in expressing depth and distance. Early adopters included Hokusai in his Thirty Six Views of Mount Fuji, hiroshige also used Prussian blue extensively in his landscape prints. Other prominent Japanese artists to use it included Keisai Eisen, Utagawa Kunisada, the theory that aizuri-e production was prompted by the 1842 sumptuary laws known as the Tenpō Reforms is no longer widely accepted
33.
Hiroshige II
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Hiroshige II was a Japanese designer of ukiyo-e art. He inherited the name Hiroshige II following the death in 1858 of his master Hiroshige, in 1865 he moved from Edo to Yokohama in 1865 after dissolving his marriage and began using the name Kisai Risshō. His work so resembles that of his master that scholars have often confused them, born Suzuki Chinpei in 1826, it is said that he was born to a fireman, as was his master Hiroshige to whom he became apprenticed under the name Shigenobu at an unknown age. His earliest known work is the illustrations for a book called Twenty-four Paragons of Japan and China from 1849. Hiroshige II produced a number of commissioned work in the 1850s in the style of the elder Hiroshige, and often signed his work Ichiryūsai mon. In 1858, he married Hiroshige Is daughter Otatsu after the death and inherited the Hiroshige name. The artist moved from Edo to Yokohama in 1865 after dissolving his marriage, during this decade he produced a number of collaborative print series, particularly with Kunisada, who had earlier worked with Hiroshige I. In his final years he turned mainly to decorating works intended for export, such as tea chests, kites, on 17 September 1869 he died at the age of 44. Hiroshige I took on few students, Hiroshige II was the most successful of these and his works have often been confounded with those of his master, which they resemble closely in style, subject, and signature. Early Western scholars did not even recognize him as a separate artist, another pupil of the first Hiroshige, Shigemasa, later married the masters daughter, Otatsu, and also began using the name Hiroshige, this artist now is known as Hiroshige III. One Hundred Views of Japan Works by Hiroshige II Utagawa school List of Utagawa school members Hiroshige II in, Forbes, Andrew, Henley, images from the Floating World, The Japanese Print. ISBN9780192114471, OCLC5246796 Newland, Amy Reigle, hotei Encyclopedia of Japanese Woodblock Prints
34.
Washi
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Washi is a style of paper that was first made in Japan. Washi is commonly made using fibers from the bark of the tree, the mitsumata shrub, or the paper mulberry, but also can be made using bamboo, hemp, rice. The word washi comes from wa Japanese and shi paper, as a Japanese craft it registered as a UNESCO intangible cultural heritage. Washi is generally tougher than ordinary paper made from wood pulp, origami, Shodo, and Ukiyo-e were all produced using washi. Washi was also used to various everyday goods like clothes, household goods. It was even used to make wreaths that were given to winners in the 1998 Winter Paralympics, several kinds of washi, referred to collectively as Japanese tissue, are used in the conservation and mending of books. Washi is produced in a way similar to that of ordinary paper and it involves a long and intricate process that is often undertaken in the cold weather of winter, as pure, cold running water is essential to the production of washi. Cold inhibits bacteria, preventing the decomposition of the fibres, cold also makes the fibres contract, producing a crisp feel to the paper. It is traditionally the winter work of farmers, a task that supplemented a farmers income, kozo, a type of mulberry, is the most commonly used fiber in making Japanese paper. The kozo branches are boiled and stripped of their outer bark, the fibers are then boiled with lye to remove the starch, fat and tannin, and then placed in running water to remove the lye. The fibers are then bleached and any remaining impurities in the fibers are picked out by hand, the kozo is laid on a rock or board and beaten. Wet balls of pulp are mixed in a vat with water, in both methods, pulp is scooped onto a screen and shaken to spread the fibers evenly. Nagashi-zuki produces a paper, while tame-zuki produces a thicker paper. With enough processing, almost any grass or tree can be made into a washi, gampi, mitsumata, and paper mulberry are three popular sources. Ganpishi - In ancient times, it was called Hishi, ganpishi has a smooth, shiny surface and is used for books and crafts. Kozogami - Kozogami is made from mulberry and it is the most widely made type of washi. It has a closer to cloth than to ordinary paper. Mitsumatagami - Mitsumatagami has an ivory-colored, fine surface and is used for shodo as well as printing and it was used to print paper money in Meiji period
35.
Benizuri-e
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Benizuri-e are a type of primitive ukiyo-e style Japanese woodblock prints. They were usually printed in pink and green, occasionally with the addition of another color, the production of benizuri-e reached its peak in the early 1740s. Torii Kiyohiro, Torii Kiyomitsu I, Torii Kiyonobu I, Okumura Masanobu, Nishimura Shigenaga, images from the Floating World, The Japanese Print. ISBN9780192114471, OCLC5246796 Newland, Amy Reigle, hotei Encyclopedia of Japanese Woodblock Prints. ISBN9789074822657, OCLC61666175 Roberts, Laurance P, a Dictionary of Japanese Artists, Tokyo, Weatherhill,1976,218
36.
Urushi-e
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Urushi-e woodblock prints were made using thick, dark black lines, and were sometimes hand-colored. The ink was mixed with a glue called nikawa, which thickened it and gave it a lustrous shine. Most often, this was used not in creating the entire print, prints which include urushi-e elements are likely to also feature the use of mica, metal dusts, and other elements which enhanced the appearance, quality and value of the works. The technique was most popular in the early 18th century, and can be seen in works by Okumura Masanobu, Torii Kiyomasu and Torii Kiyonobu I, in painting, the term refers to the use of colored lacquers, produced by mixing pigments with clear lacquer. Until the 19th century, however, the use of natural pigments restricted the colors accessible to artists to red, black, yellow, green, and light brown. Artist Shibata Zeshin is particularly famous for his innovations in this regard, and was perhaps the first to use lacquer not just as a decorative element but as a medium for painted scrolls
37.
Lacquer
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The term lacquer is used for a number of hard and potentially shiny finishes applied to materials such as wood. These fall into a number of different groups. This dries to a hard and smooth surface layer which is durable, waterproof. Asian lacquer is sometimes painted with pictures, inlaid with shell and other materials, or carved, as well as dusted with gold and given other further decorative treatments. In modern techniques, lacquer means a range of clear or coloured wood finishes that dry by solvent evaporation or a process that produces a hard. The finish can be of any level from ultra matte to high gloss. It is also used for paint, which is a paint that typically dries better on a hard. Lacquer is more durable than shellac and these ultimately derive from Sanskrit lākshā, which was used for both the Lac insect and the scarlet resinous secretion it produces that was used as wood finish. Lac resin was once imported in quantity into Europe from India along with Eastern woods. Lacquer sheen is a measurement of the shine for a given lacquer, different manufacturers have their own names and standards for their sheen. The most common names from least shiny to most shiny are, flat, matte, egg shell, satin, semi-gloss, urushiol-based lacquers differ from most others, being slow-drying, and set by oxidation and polymerization, rather than by evaporation alone. In order for it to set properly it requires a humid, the phenols oxidize and polymerize under the action of an enzyme laccase, yielding a substrate that, upon proper evaporation of its water content, is hard. These lacquers produce very hard, durable finishes that are beautiful and very resistant to damage by water, acid, alkali or abrasion. The active ingredient of the resin is urushiol, a mixture of various phenols suspended in water, the resin is derived from a tree indigenous to China, species Toxicodendron vernicifluum, commonly known as the Lacquer Tree. The fresh resin from the T. vernicifluum trees causes urushiol-induced contact dermatitis, the Chinese treated the allergic reaction with crushed shellfish, which supposedly prevents lacquer from drying properly. Lacquer skills became very highly developed in Asia, and many highly decorated pieces were produced, the earliest extant lacquer object, a red wooden bowl, was unearthed at a Hemudu culture site in China. By the Han Dynasty, many centres of production became firmly established. The knowledge of the Chinese methods of the process spread from China during the Han, Tang and Song dynasties, eventually it was introduced to Korea, Japan, Southeast
