FA 197A Studies in Asian Art: Tradition, Modernity, and Transculturalism

FA 197a Studies in Asian Art: Tradition, Modernity, and Transculturalism Spring 2015 Monday 2:00-4:50pm

Prof. Aida Yuen Wong Office: Room 212, Mandel Center for the Humanities Office hours: Thursday 1:00-3:00pm (or by appointment) Email: [email protected] Phone: x62670

Course Description and Objectives What is tradition? Why do we need it? How has “Asian” art represented, assimilated, and promoted the idea of tradition against the backdrop of modernization, expansionism, and globalization? Through traditionalist expressions in pottery, painting, calligraphy, architecture, textile art, among other media, this seminar examines the ways in which inherited practices remain a fertile source for Asian creativity after the nineteenth century. At the center of our discussion are constructs of national identiy in an interconnected world.

Requirements

1. Attendance. Active participation in class discussions and regular completion of reading assignments are expected. Oral introduction of a reading (at least once). 30%

Active, earnest, thoughtful and prepared (25% or up) Mostly passive but diligent and attentive (20% or up) Little apparent sign of engagement and preparedness (below 20%)

More than two unexcused absences will negatively affect your grade; explain your absences in writing.

2. Journal: reflect on issues raised in class each week and introduce personal experiences and opinions whenever relevant. Two “gaps” are allowed for the entire semester. Journal entries are not required for the weeks of oral presentations. Due: February 23 and April 20. 20%

Each journal entry should be about 500-700 words. Start by summarizing the main ideas discussed in class and your views about them. You could also explore whether and how these ideas relate to your experiences, interests, and perspectives. Give specific examples. Additional research is appreciated but not required.

3. Oral presentation on a research topic of your choice in consultation with me. 40 minutes per presentation. 25%

1 4. Final research paper; topic is identical to the oral presentation. It is a written elaboration and refinement of the oral presentation. More instructions will be given around the middle of the semester. Due April 27. 25%

Readings

Weekly readings are available on LATTE (assignments are listed in the calendar below). Before coming to class you should have already read the essays assigned for the day. You will be asked to explain the main points of the readings and be ready to pose questions regarding their contents and assumptions. You are expected to approach the materials thoughtfully and sometimes critically. Some of the readings are meant to give you the relevant historical background for understanding the topic of the week, while others involve specific viewpoints.

Calendar (Subject to modification)

Week 1: Introduction (January 12): Modernism, Tradition, and Transculturalism Reading 1: Clark, John. "Formation of the Neo-Traditional." Modern Asian Art (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1998), 71-87. Reading 2: Shimizu, Yoshiaki. "Japan in American Museums: But Which Japan?" The Art Bulletin 83, no. 1 (March 2001): 123-134. Week 2: Martin Luther King Day: Class in recess (January 19) Week 3: Brush Painting I: Intersections between Japan and India (January 26) Reading 1: Wattles, Miriam. “The 1909 Ryūtō and the Aesthetics of Affectivity.”Art Journal 44, no. 3 (Autumn 1996): 48-56. Reading 2: Matsumoto, Kenichi. "Okakura Tenshin and the Ideal of Pan-Asianism." In Brij Tankha, ed., Shadows of the Past: Of Okakura Tenshin and Pan-Asianism (Calcultta, Sampark, 2007), 20-33. Reading 3: Wong, Aida Yuen. "Landscapes of Nandlal (Nandalal) Bose (1882-1966): Japanism and Populism in Modern India." In Brij Tankha, ed., Shadows of the Past: Of Okakura Tenshin and Pan-Asianism (Calcutta: Sampark, 2007), 107-124. Optional Reading: Inaga, Shigemi. "The Interaction of Bengali and Japanese Artistic Milieus in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (1901-1945): Rabindranath Tagore, Arai Kanpo, and Nandalal Bose." Japan Review: Journal of the International Research Center for Japanese Studies, no. 21 (2009): 149-181. Week 4: Brush Painting II: Intersections between Japan and China (February 2) Reading 1: Berry, Paul. “The Relationship of Japanese Literati Painting to Nihonga.” In Michiyo Morioka and Paul Berry, eds. The Transformation of Japanese Painting Traditions (Seattle: Seattle Art Museum and University of Washington Press, 1999), 32– 39. Reading 2: Andrews, Julia F. “In Search of Modernity: Aspects of Chinese and Japanese Exchange in the Republican Era.” Proceedings of the International Conference for Chinese Modern Paintings Researches [sic] (Kyoto: Kyoto National Museum, 2009), 3– 28. Reading 3: Maeda Tamaki and Aida Yuen Wong. “Kindred Spirits: Fu Baoshi and the Japanese Art World.” In Anita Chung, ed. Chinese Art in the Age of Revolution: Fu Baoshi (1904–1965). The Cleveland Museum of Art, exh. cat. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press), 35–42. Week 5: Bijinga (Painting of Beautiful Women): Japan and its Colonies (February 9) Reading 1: Bacon, Alice M. Japanese Girls and Women (London: Kegan Paul, 2001), 267–295. (This book by a long-time American resident in Japan was originally published around 1900.) Reading 2: Yamada Nanako and Helen Merritt. “Uemura Shoen: Her Paintings of Beautiful Women.” Woman’s Art Journal 13, no. 12 (Autumn 1992–Winter 1993): 12– 16. Reading 3: Kim, Yisoon. “Female Images in 1930s Korea: Virtuous Women and Good Mothers.” In Aida Yuen Wong, ed.,Visualizing Beauty: Gender and Ideology in Modern East Asia (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2012), 91–101. Week 6: Spring Break (February 16; Class in Recess)

Week 7: Mingei (Folk Craft) and the Aesthetic of Imperfection (February 23) Reading 1: Yanagi, Soetsu. “The Kizaemon Tea-bowl” (1931). Reprinted in The Unknown Craftsman (Tokyo, New York, and London: Kodansha International, 1989), 190-196. Reading 2: Kikuchi, Yuko. “Hybridity and the Orient Orientalism of ‘Mingei Theory.” Journal of Design History 10, no. 4 (1997): 343–354. Reading 3: Wong, Aida Yuen. “Kishida Ryūsei: Painter of the ‘Oriental Grotesque’ and the Mingei Movement.” In Inaga Shigemi, ed., Questioning Oriental Aesthetics and Thinking: Conflicting Visions of “Asia” under the Colonial Empires. Proceedings of the 38th International Research Symposium (Kyoto: International Research Center, 2010), 185–196. First installment of Journal due. Week 8: Calligraphy and Seal Carving (March 2) Reading 1: Addiss, Stephen. “Nantenbo Toju (1839-1925).” In The Art of Zen: Paintings and Calligraphy by Japanese Monks, 1600-1925 (New York: Harry H. Abrams, 1989), 186–204. Reading 2: Holmberg, Ryan. “The Pseudography of Hidai Nankoku,” Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, Recent Acquisitions (2008): 111–117.

3 Reading 3: Rose, Barbara. “Japanese Calligraphy and American Abstract Expressionism.” In Words in Motion: Modern Japanese Calligraphy (Tokyo: Hirohashi Printing and Photo-engraving Co., Ltd., 1984), 38-43. Reading 4: Bai, Qianshen and John Finlay. "The World Within a Square Inch: Modern Developments in Chinese Seal Carving." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin (1993): 26- 63. Week 9: Vernacularism and Modern/Contemporary Architecture (March 9) Reading 1: Matsuda, Naonori. “Japan’s Traditional Houses: The Significance of Spatial Conceptions.” In Ronald G. Knapp. Asia’s Old Dwellings: Tradition, Resilience, and Change (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 2003), 285–318. Reading 2: Rudofsky, Bernard. “A House for the Summer.” The Kimono Mind: An Informal Guide to Japan and the Japanese with a New Postscript by the Author (1965). Reprint. (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1982), 112–132. Reading 3: Bognar, Botond. “An Architecture of Dissolution? The Work of Kengo Kuma.” Kengo Kuma Selected Works (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2005), 18–41. Video: First Person Singular: I.M. Pei Week 10: Japanese-American Art (March 16)

Reading 1: Higa, Karin. "Some Thoughts on National and Cultural Identity: Art by Contemporary Japanese and Japanese American Artists." Art Journal 55, no. 3, Japan 1868-1945: Art, Architecture, and National Identity (Autumn 1996): 6-13. Reading 2: Levin, Gail. “Between Two Worlds: Folk Culture, Identity, and the American Art of Yasuo Kuniyoshi.” Archives of American Art Journal 43, no. 3/4 (2003): 2-17. Reading 3: Lyford, Amy. “Noguchi, Sculptural Abstraction, and the Politics of Japanese American Internment.” The Art Bulletin 85, no. 1 (March 2001): 137–151. Reading 4: Yoshimoto, Midori. “Review of The Sculpture of Ruth Asawa: Contours in the Air by Daniel Cornell.” Woman’s Art Journal 29, no. 1 (Spring–Summer 2008): 60- 61. Optional: Maeda, Robert. Noguchi, Isamu and the Peking Drawing of 1930. American Art 13, no. 1 (Spring 1999): 84-93. Week 11: March 23 Presentations

Week 12: March 30 Presentations

Week 13: April 6 Passover Break

Week 14: April 13 Presentations

Week 15: April 20 Presentations Second installment of Journal due.

Week 16 April 27: Painting in Taiwan Reading 1: Kuo, Jason C. "Painting, Decolonization, and Cultural Politics in Postwar Taiwan." In Ars Orientalis, vol 25, Chinese Painting (1995): 73-84. Reading 2: Chun, Allen. "From Nationalism to Nationalizing: Cultural Imagination and State Formation in Postwar Taiwan." The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, no. 31 (Jan 1994): 49-69. Final Paper Due

If you are a student with a documented disability on record at Brandeis University and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you in this class, please provide the relevant documentation immediately.

You are expected to be honest in all of your academic work. The University policy on academic honesty is distributed annually as section 5 of the Rights and Responsibilities handbook. Instances of alleged dishonesty will be forwarded to the Office of Campus Life for possible referral to the Student Judicial System. Potential Sanctions include failure in the course and suspension from the University. If you have any questions about my expectations, please ask.