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Translation Errors Involving Nihonga (Japanese Painting)

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Translation Errors Involving Nihonga (Japanese Painting) Translation Errors Involving Nihonga (Japanese Painting): An Argument to Correct the Record [PP: 13-14] Jim Hathaway Dokkyo University, Saitama Tokyo Kasei University, Tokyo Tama Art University, Tokyo Japan ABSTRACT The word Nihonga (Japanese painting) carries such a weight of cultural importance in the Japanese painting community as to make the translation of words describing Nihonga problematic. This paper explores reasons this has happened making use of standard texts on the materials and techniques of painting and investigating modern Japanese painting history, concluding that because Japanese art was under such great pressure from the popularity enjoyed by Western styled painting being newly imported in the Meiji Era (1868- 1912) that at its conception the modern school of Nihonga attempted to distinguish itself from this foreign invasion, creating problems that remain with translation of Nihonga terms to the present day. Keywords: Nihonga, Japanese Painting, Japanese Painting History, Materials and Techniques of Painting ARTICLE The paper received on Reviewed on Accepted after revisions on INFO 20/07/2020 25/08/2020 01/10/2020 Suggested citation: Hathaway, J. (2020). Translation Errors Involving Nihonga (Japanese Painting): An Argument to Correct the Record. International Journal of English Language & Translation Studies. 8(3). 13-14. 1. Introduction way, “Etching on paper,” “Oil on canvas,” Takamura Kotaro was part of an early “Acrylic on board,” while Nihonga generation of artists to travel outside of was translated as, “Mineral pigments on Japan to study in America and Europe. He Japanese paper.” brought his studies home when he returned To understand why this practice is to Japan. He translated foreign books. He strange it is important to understand what translated a book on van Gogh. He paint is. Paint is basically two things. Paint translated Walt Whitman into Japanese. is pigment (the color) and a binder (a (Sato, 1992) substance to adhere the pigment to a surface, In Kotoro’s essay, Green Sun, he i.e. glue.) All paints are made from pigments wrote, “The so-called Japanese-style and a binder. (Wehlte,1975) For oil paint the painters can’t move forward, marked by the binder is oil, vegetable, or nut oil. It is term “Japanese-style. The so-called called, “oil paint, or oil.” For acrylic paint, Western-style painters can’t, either, weighed the binder is an acrylic polymer, and is down by oil paint on their backs. Sometimes called, “acrylic paint, or acrylic.” For egg you end up being more protective of the tempera the binder is the protein found in pawn than the knight.” ( Sato, 1992, p.180) the yellow yolk of an egg. This is called, I have noticed anomalies in the “egg tempera,” or simply, “tempera.” There translation of words concerned are different forms of tempera. Casein with, “Nihonga,” “Japanese painting.” tempera uses milk protein as a binder. It may Whether it is from xenophobia or cultural be called, “tempera,” “casein tempera,” or, pride, words describing Nihonga are “casein.” Nihonga paint is a form of routinely romanticized and translated in a tempera. The binder for Nihonga paint is non-standard way to set Nihonga apart from protein derived from animal skins. Yet it is all other forms of painting. not called, “tempera,” or, “skin tempera,” or This problem was driven home to me even, “gelatin tempera.” It is called, when I was given the task of rewriting the “mineral pigments on Japanese paper”, an English translation of a large catalog of admittedly more romantic description, but graduate works for a major Japanese art deceptive, as all paints are made from university. Terms for western materials and pigment. The translation has no meaning. If techniques were translated in a standard the painting was made in Europe, or International Journal of English Language & Translation Studies (www.eltsjournal.org) ISSN:2308-5460 Volume: 08 Issue: 03 July-September, 2020 America, it would be called, “Tempera on different from Western art. All the large Art paper”. (Mayer, 1951) universities in Japan to this day have two “Mineral pigments,” is also vexed. painting departments; “Japanese painting,” Japanese painting was originally done with and, “Western painting.” This never natural pigments made for the most part happened with ceramics, sculpture, or design from stones, metals, earth, but that was long in Japan. Japanese Nihonga artists felt ago. As early as the Edo Era, artificial Japanese painting was particularly under fire pigments were imported to Japan from and had to be protected. Okakura Kakuzo Europe and were used by Japanese artists. and his group of exceptional artists raised a (Bickford, 1982) Japanese challenge to Western painting, a I think you will find Hokusai used challenge to Western painting’s shading and Prussian blue, a pigment invented by a perspective with Japanese washes of sparkly German chemist by creating an oxidation of whitened atmosphere, while in many ways ferrocyanide salts (originally made from, imitating the Western art they were fighting among other things, animal blood). Animal against, stepping back from the lines that so blood is not a mineral. I believe Hokusai defined Japanese painting. In the end also used a red made from aniline dye (coal Nihonga has defined itself by its materials tar). (Bickford, 1982) rather than its design. If you go to an Nihonga artists use these materials exhibition of Nihonga now it can look very today. I don’t believe there are many young much like the oil paintings in the next room, art students who can afford to use natural with one exception, mineral pigments on ultramarine blue made from the gem stone Japanese paper. lapis lazuli. “Nihonga” (paint) should be Sum Up translated in a catalog, or museum as, Thus, we get “Oil painting,” “Acrylic “Tempera on paper.” To label it, “Mineral painting,” “Watercolor painting,” and pigments on Japanese paper,” is culture spin. “Tempera painting,” vs. “Mineral pigments Even the softer, “color on paper.” commonly on Japanese paper.” It is deceptive. It is the used by Japanese museums is incomplete. thing Kotaro warned us about. It is This willful, not an error in translation. protecting the pawn rather than the knight. It goes back to the creation of “Nihonga,” in 1906, led by Okakura Kakuzo, a great References protector of Japanese culture that was under Bickford, Lawrence R. (1982, No.7 fire in the Meiji Era. Okakura was a Autumn) The Pigment Story, principle involved in establishing the Impressions, The Japan Society of National Art Museum, the Tokyo Art America. School, later to become the National Encyclopedia Britannica, (February 20, University of Fine Arts and Music. At the 2020) Encyclopedia Britannica, inc. age of 25 he became the second president of URL:https://www.britannica. the Tokyo Art School, later breaking from com/biography/Okakura-Kakuzo the school to form his own art society to Gordenker, Alice (accessed 7/2020) protect and promote Japanese painting. Nihonga on the Rocks: The Tenshin (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2020) In 1906 Memorial Museum of Art, Okakura gathered his best students including Ibaraki, Taikan Yokoyama, Shunso Hishida, Kanzan http://www.dnp.co.jp/artscape/eng/fo Shimomura and Buzan Kimura. Together cus/1707_01.html they invented, “Nihonga,” as a reaction to Mayer, Ralph (1951) The Artist’s Handbook the rising influence of Western art. of Materials and Techniques, Faber (Gordenker, 2020) and Faber, London “At the time, Japanese painting was Sato, Hirosaki (1992) A brief History of widely regarded as flat and primitive Imbecility, Poetry and Prose of compared to Western painting. The primary Takamura Koraro, University of complaint was that it lacked the mechanisms Hawaii Press used in Western art, including scientific Wehlte, Kurt (1975) The Materials and perspective and chiaroscuro shading, that Techniques of Painting, Van create dimension and variations in Nostrand Reinhold Company, New light.”(Gordenker, 2020) York The creation of this new school of painting was called Nihonga, as it was a reaction to Western art Nihonga sought to differentiate itself, to define itself as Cite this article as: Hathaway, J. (2020). Translation Errors Involving Nihonga (Japanese Painting): An Argument to Correct the Record. International Journal of English Language & Translation Studies. 8(3). 13-14. Page | 14 .
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