edwardian london through japanese eyes: the art and writings of yoshio markino, 1897–1915 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd i 25-10-11 18:16 japanese visual culture Volume 4 Managing Editor John T. Carpenter jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd ii 25-10-11 18:16 Edwardian London through Japanese Eyes: The Art and Writings of Yoshio Markino, 1897–1915 by william s. rodner with a foreword by sir hugh cortazzi Leiden – Boston 2012 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd iii 25-10-11 18:16 Published by Copyright 2012 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, BRILL The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the Plantijnstraat 2 imprints Brill, Global Oriental, Hotei Publishing, IDC 2321 JC Leiden Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. The Netherlands brill.nl/jvc All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or Text editing transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, John T. Carpenter with Alfred Haft mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Design Studio Berry Slok, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (cover) Brill has made all reasonable eff orts to trace all right SPi, Tamilnadu, India holders to any copyrighted material used in this work. In cases where these eff orts have not been successful the Production publisher welcomes communications from copyright High Trade BV, Zwolle, The Netherlands holders, so that the appropriate acknowledgements can be Printed in Hungary made in future editions, and to settle other permission matters. ISBN 978-90-04-22039-3 Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Rodner, William S., 1948- Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, Edwardian London through Japanese eyes : MA 01923, USA. the art and writings of Yoshio Markino, 1897-1915 / by Fees are subject to change. William S. Rodner ; with a foreword by Hugh Cortazzi. p. cm. -- (Japanese visual culture ; v. 4) Financial support, editorial and logistical assistance was Includes bibliographical references and index. provided by: ISBN 978-90-04-22039-3 (hardback : alk. paper) Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese 1. Makino, Yoshio, b. 1874--Criticism and Arts and Cultures, UK interpretation. 2. London (England)--In art. 3. City and town life--England--London--History--20th century. Cover image: 4. London (England)--Description and travel. 5. London Markino. Autumn, in The Studio, 33 (1904). (England)--Social life and customs--20th century. I. Makino, Yoshio, b. 1874. II. Title. III. Title: Art and writings of Yoshio Markino, 1897-1915. NX584.Z9M337 2011 759.952--dc23 2011037333 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd iv 25-10-11 18:16 For Lorraine jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd v 25-10-11 18:16 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd vi 25-10-11 18:16 Contents Foreword Sir Hugh Cortazzi xi Acknowledgments xiv introduction 1 Japan and the British Imagination 4 Japanese in Britain 6 Markino the Artist: Context and Sources 8 Structure of the Book 10 1 japan in britain 15 Engaging with Japan: Exhibitions, Books and Articles 15 The Lure of Japanese Art 17 Laurence Binyon and East Asian Civilization 19 Collectors 21 The Japan Society and Japanese Voices 22 Periodicals and Japanese Art 24 Reaching a Wide Audience 25 Authenticity and Darling of the Gods 26 Markino Speaks for Japan 29 The Japan-British Exhibition 31 2 “heiji of london fog” 35 A Noxious Atmosphere 35 The Lover of Fog 39 Grey Days 43 Lighting the Mist 45 Glimpses of Transport 56 Walking the Shrouded Streets 60 3 “between two stools” 67 An Alien Witness 68 The Hybrid Style 73 Early Engagement with the West 82 4 “a mirror of unknown genre” 93 Categories of Perception 95 London’s Parks 111 Theaters and the Ballet 116 vii jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd vii 25-10-11 18:16 5 my idealed john bullesses 121 Women Friends 123 A Taste for Fashion 126 Shopping 134 Women’s Rights 137 6 making a career 143 Colour Books 143 Struggling for Recognition 144 M. H. Spielmann 146 Publishing in Color 148 The Colour of London 150 Douglas Sladen 154 7 the chelsea conservative 165 Kensington Pride 168 Decline 172 A Changed Atmosphere 176 Conclusion 177 Endnotes 178 Yoshio Markino: Chronology of His Life and Work 195 Bibliography 199 Index 208 viii jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd viii 25-10-11 18:16 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd ix 25-10-11 18:16 jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd x 10-11-11 11:07 Foreword oshio markino (1869–1956) was a tal- He was born in Komoro, now Toyota city, the ented Japanese artist and eccentric writer headquarters of the giant Japanese car company, Ywho fell in love with London. He lived in Toyota Motor Corporation. His family was of London for most of the time between his fi rst ar- samurai stock. Like many other samurai who had rival in 1897 and his enforced return to Japan in lost their privileged status with the downfall of the 1942 following the outbreak of war between Japan Tokugawa shogunate and the beginning of the and Britain. Markino’s best paintings, drawings Meiji period (1868–1912), they no longer had a fi xed and writings were done in the Edwardian era and role in Japanese society and were poor. As a child the years up to the beginning of the First World he was anxious to learn and studied English with War in 1914. The 1920s and 1930s when Anglo- narrow-minded Protestant missionaries. He man- Japanese relations changed from friendship to hos- aged to get himself to the West Coast of the United tility saw a decline in his popularity and output. States where he tried to train as an artist. He was He was an artist with a fi ne sense of colour who unhappy there both because of the anti-Japanese combined Japanese and Western traditions in his feeling which he encountered and because of his paintings and drawings. His impressionistic water- hand-to-mouth existence. colours were infl uenced more by J. M. W. Turner’s He decided to move to Britain where he arrived paintings, which he saw in British galleries, than by in 1897. In A Japanese Artist in London, published the works of the French Impressionists and Post- in London in 1910, he described his arrival from Impressionists, which he criticized stridently. He France at Newhaven in Sussex: “From the very fi rst walked the London streets tirelessly and sketched it seemed to me to be a New Heaven; I had such wherever he went and anything which attracted a good impression with England.” His love of him. Yet, he had a Japanese sensitivity to nature England did not fade despite the poverty and hard and a Japanese understanding of the beauty of times which he suff ered during his early years in mists and rain. “London without mists would,” he London. He often went without meals and tramped thought, “be like a bride without a trousseau.” To everywhere around London as he could not aff ord him, “the wet pavements refl ect everything as if the bus or tram fares. He found London landladies whole city was built on a lake.” Mountains in cloud kind and friendly. Seeing him going hungry they of- and mists were a favorite theme of traditional Japa- ten shared their family meals with him. nese artists and many Japanese think that fl owers His eff orts to fi nd buyers for his sketches proved and landscapes are more beautiful in the rain than largely fruitless until 1902 when he met Marion in sunlight. Harry Spielmann, editor of The Magazine of Art. He Makino Yoshio, as he was called in the Japanese then met Douglas Sladen who had been the fi rst name order of surname followed by given name, editor of Who’s Who and who became his best added an “r” to make his surname easier for English friend and his agent. people to pronounce correctly. Markino made friends easily and became a true Anglophile. His friendship with Sladen and with his Japanese compatriots Yoné Noguchi, the art and literary critic, and with Bushō Hara, another Markino. The Embankment, London (1929). Signed woodblock print presented by the artist to Professor Japanese artist in London, helped to make him not Carmen Blacker. Collection of Sir Hugh and Lady only a successful artist and illustrator but also hap- Cortazzi. pier than he had ever been. Sladen in a foreword xi jvc4_p001_220_HT.indd xi 25-10-11 18:16 edwardian london through japanese eyes Markino. The Embankment, London (1929). Signed woodblock print presented by the artist to Professor Carmen Blacker. Collection of Sir Hugh and Lady Cortazzi. to A Japanese Artist in London wrote of his friend: she saw, he was too busy to have much time to help “Yoshio Markino is more like a spirit than most her but that if she thought it would do any good he of the spirits clothed in fl esh which we call hu- would marry her. They duly got married, but in man beings. At houses where he opens his heart 1927 they had an amicable divorce, the marriage not to their inmates and feels intimate, he fl utters in having apparently been consummated. bubbling over with news and excitement—he al- As war between Britain and Japan approached ways has news even if he has met them an hour Markino was invited by the Japanese ambassador ago—he counts his friends as it were, to see if Mamoru Shigemitsu to stay in the Japanese embas- they are all there, gathers each to himself with some sy in London. During and after the war, even while little private touch, and then sits down on the he was serving his prison sentence from the Tokyo fl oor….” International War Crimes Tribunal, Shigemitsu His admiration for English women, his “idealed provided Markino with accommodation in Kam- John Bullesses,” was almost certainly platonic.