A glimpse into the markets, crafts, and signage of early modern Japan Kanban are the traditional signs Japanese merchants displayed on the street to advertise their presence, represent the products and services to be found inside their shops, and lend a sense of individuality to the shops themselves. Created from wood, bamboo, iron, paper, fabric, gold leaf, and lacquer, these unique objects evoke the frenetic market scenes of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japan, where merchants created a multifaceted world of symbol and meaning designed to engage the viewer and entice the customer. Kanban provides a tantalizing look at this distinctive fusion of art and commerce. This beautifully illustrated book traces the history of shop signs in Japan, examines how they were created, and explores some of the businesses and trades they advertised. Some kanban are elongated panels of lacquered wood painted with elegant calligraphy and striking images, while others are ornately carved representative sculptures of munificent deities or carp climbing waterfalls. There are oversized functional Buddhist prayer beads, and everyday objects such as tobacco pipes, shoes, combs, and writing brushes. The book also includes archival photographs of market life in "old Japan," woodblock prints of bustling marketplaces, and images of the goods advertised with these intricate and beguiling objects. Providing a look into a unique, handmade world, Kanban offers new insights into Japan's commercial and artistic roots, the evolution of trade, the links between commerce and entertainment, and the emergence of mass consumer culture. Exhibition schedule: Mingei International Museum, San Diego April 15-October 15, 2017

The brothers Chen Yufan (*1973) and Chen Yujun (*1976) have been working together non-stop on their huge project Mulan River since 2008. Starting with a river near their hometown of Putian, in the province of Fujian, they discovered a way to add the cultural and social experiences of “Chinese who return home to their cities from overseas” to the context of contemporary art. Inspired by profound transformations in society and their unique ancestral history, Mulan River took on a variety of artistic forms over the years, including installation, painting, and video. “Mulan River refers to that local geographic position, while also symbolising a fluid cultural space. This concept of ‘fluidity’ is not only manifest in the Chen brothers’ content and subject matter, but more importantly, it brings a new understanding of their working approach to art.” Mulan River has already been on display numerous times as part of various exhibitions. This is the first publication to cover the entire work of art. Text in English and Chinese.

Hokusai created sublime works during the last thirty years of his life, right up to his death at the age of ninety. Publications have hitherto presented his long career as a chronological sequence. This book takes a fresh approach based on innovative scholarship: thematic groupings of works are related to the major spiritual and artistic quests of Hokusai's life. Hokusai's personal beliefs are studied here through major brush paintings, drawings, woodblock prints and illustrated books. The book gives due attention to the contribution of Hokusai's daughter Eijo (Oi), an accomplished artist in her own right. Hokusai continually explored the mutability and minutiae of natural phenomena in his art. His late subjects and styles were based on a mastery of eclectic Japanese, Chinese and European techniques and an encyclopaedic knowledge of nature, myth, and history. Mount Fuji was the most significant model for Hokusai in his quest for immortality. This collection of Hokusai's works draws on the finest to be found in Japan and around the world, making this the most important publication for years on Hokusai, and a uniquely valuable overview of the artist's late career.

A collection of works by celebrated Chinese artist Lu Ming, who is widely recognized as the leading representative of Chinese realist comics. Few artists are as complete as Lu Ming. Known for his hyper-realistic comics and his universe inspired by both medieval (Chinese and European) and music (he is also a professional guitarist and drummer), this collection is a look at his paintings, advertising illustrations (for which he won a Palme d'or at the Cannes Lion festival in 2008), storyboard and conceptual design work for feature films (including the legendary Tsui Hark's Flying Sabers), and his sculptures (including the monumental "Desert Grade" presented at the Burning Man festival in Nevada)."

"Graham has crafted a compact, jewel-like resource for all who seek to understand the sources, evolution, impact, and value of Japanese aesthetics and design principles in our modern world." --Dr. Jane Schall, Sanders Sosland Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art This beautifully illustrated guide offers stunning visual examples and detailed discussions of the objects, aesthetics, philosophy and cultural significance of Japanese design. Asian art expert Dr. Patricia Graham helps guide readers through the aspects of Japanese art and design we've all come to appreciate--whether it's a silk kimono, carefully raked garden path or modern snack food packaging. From the ten key characteristics of Japanese design to the Shinto and Buddhist influences on its aesthetics, this book serves as a great resource for the different styles and how they developed. Another fascinating and less explored piece of design in Japan is its influence on and interpretation by Westerners. From Frank Lloyd Wright to Lafcadio Hearn, artists, scientists, designers, journalists and philosophers were inspired by Japan's arts and crafts in the 19th century. This often romanticized version of Japanese design--viewed through a Western cultural lens--continues to influence our view of it to this day. Graham unpacks the sincere, but sometimes misguided, interpretations of concepts like wabi sabi and shibui. With more than 200 stunning color photos, this detailed guide will be enjoyed by everyone from professional designers to art students, and museum geeks to Japanophiles.

In Chinese Symbolism and Art Motifs Fourth Edition, scholar C.A.S. Williams offers concise explanations of the important symbols and motifs relevant to Chinese literature, arts and crafts, and architecture. This reference book has been a standard among students of Chinese culture and history since 1941 and, in its Fourth Edition, has been completely reset with Pinyin pronunciation of Chinese names and words. Organized alphabetically, enhanced by over 400 illustrations, and clearly written for accessibility across a variety of fields, this book not only explains symbols and motifs essential to any designer, art collector, or historian, but delves into ancient customs in religion, food, agriculture, and medicine. Some of the symbols and motifs explicated are: The Eight Immortals, The Five Elements, The Dragon, The Phoenix, Yin and Yang. With Chinese Symbolism and Art Motifs, you can access hidden insights into the intentions behind works of Chinese craftsmanship, and the thorough explanations of each symbol, accompanied by the historical origins from which they arose, will complement your existing knowledge of any area of Chinese culture, or help you confidently explore new topics within the realm of Asian art and history.

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The book studies the baroque and the postmodern art and architecture of Macao, as an ex-Portuguese colony founded in the sixteenth century. Examining how the 'Baroque' has been used in critical and cultural theory, it uses this to help visitors to Macao understand its complex history, both colonial and Chinese.

Sarnath has long been regarded as the place where the Buddha preached his first sermon and established the Buddhist monastic order. Excavations at Sarnath have yielded the foundations of temples and monastic dwellings, two Buddhist reliquary mounds (stupas), and some of the most important sculptures in the history of Indian art. This volume offers the first critical examination of the historic site. Frederick M. Asher provides a longue duree (long-term) analysis of Sarnath-including the plunder, excavation, and display of antiquities and the Archaeological Survey of India's presentation-and considers what lies beyond the fenced-in excavated area. His analytical history of Sarnath's architectural and sculptural remains contains a significant study of the site's sculptures, their uneven production, and their global distribution. Asher also examines modern Sarnath, which is a living establishment replete with new temples and monasteries that constitute a Buddhist presence on the outskirts of Varanasi, the most sacred Hindu city.

In the 1990s and 2000s, contemporary art in India changed radically in form, as an art world once dominated by painting began to support installation, new media, and performance. In response to the liberalization of India's economy, art was cultivated by a booming market as well as by new nonprofit institutions that combined strong local roots and transnational connections. The result was an unprecedented efflorescence of contemporary art and growth of a network of institutions radiating out from India. Among the first studies of contemporary South Asian art, Infrastructure and Form engages with sixteen of India's leading contemporary artists and art collectives to examine what made this development possible. Karin Zitzewitz articulates the connections among formal trajectories of medium and material, curatorial frames and networks of circulation, and the changing conditions of everyday life after economic liberalization. By untangling the complex interactions of infrastructure and form, the book offers a discussion of the barriers and conduits that continue to shape global contemporary art and its relationship to capital more broadly.

HOKUSAI'S BRUSH is a companion to the Freer Gallery of Art's yearlong exhibition that celebrates the artist's fruitful career. The Freer, home to the world's largest collection of paintings by Japanese artist, Katsushika Hokusai, has put on view for the first time in a decade his incredible and rarely seen sketches, drawings and paintings. Together with essays that explore his life and career, HOKUSAI'S BRUSH offers an in-depth breakdown of each painting, providing amazing commentary that highlight Hokusai's mastery and detail. While best known for his woodblock print series "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji" and particularly the widely recognisable "The Great Wave off Kanagawa," Hokusai is said to have produced 30,000 pieces of art. He lived until he was ninety years old and his last words were reportedly to say that if heaven were to grant him another five or ten years, then he could become a true painter. Every stunning page of HOKUSAI'S BRUSH is a testament to the humility of that statement, emphasising his artistry and skill, the likes of which shaped the Impressionist movement by inspiring artists such as Monet, Degas and van Gogh.

Many traditional crafts practiced in contemporary Egypt can be traced back hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Scenes inscribed on the walls of ancient temples and tombs depict the earliest Egyptians making pottery and papyrus and working with stone, wood, and other materials. The eleven chapters of this volume explore these and other crafts that continue to flourish in Egypt. From copper and glass works to jewelry, woodwork, and hand-woven carpets and fabric, each chapter offers an in-depth look at one material or craft and the artisans who keep its traditions alive. The authors, drawing on historical sources and documentary research, sketch the evolution of each craft, looking into its origins, the development of tools and methods used in the craft, and the diverse influences that have shaped the form and function of craft items produced today, ranging widely through the pharaonic, Coptic, Islamic, and modern periods.This historical examination is complemented by extensive field research and interviews with craftsmen and women, which serve to set these crafts into a living cultural context and offer a window into the modern craft economy, the lives of craftspeople, and the local communities and traditions they express and sustain. The volume is amply illustrated with vivid photographs of contemporary craft items and artisans at work, from the coastal town of Damietta to the far-flung deserts and the ancient alleyways of Cairo. It is a narrative and visual tour that provides valuable insight into contemporary Egypt as seen through its material culture and the legions of unsung artists who nourish and enrich it.

The first English-language collection of the titular artist, "The Art of Sachiko Kaneoya" chronicles the creator's work and themes for nearly a decade, showcasing the monstrous, the romantic, and the mortal suffering of her subjects. Inspired by anime and manga from the 50s and 90s, Kaneoya's global contingent of fans has never had a easily-obtainable volume of her work... until now.

Named after an archaeological site discovered in 1951 in Zhengzhou, China, the Erligang civilization arose in the Yellow River valley around the middle of the second millennium BCE. Shortly thereafter, its distinctive elite material culture spread to a large part of China's Central Plain, in the south reaching as far as the banks of the Yangzi River. The Erligang culture is best known for the remains of an immense walled city at Zhengzhou, a smaller site at Panlongcheng in Hubei, and a large-scale bronze industry of remarkable artistic and technological sophistication.

This richly illustrated book is the first in a western language devoted to the Erligang culture. It brings together scholars from a variety of disciplines, including art history and archaeology, to explore what is known about the culture and its spectacular bronze industry. The opening chapters introduce the history of the discovery of the culture and its most important archaeological sites. Subsequent essays address a variety of important methodological issues related to the study of Erligang, including how to define the culture, the usefulness of cross-cultural comparative study, and the difficulty of reconciling traditional Chinese historiography with archaeological discoveries. The book closes by examining the role the Erligang civilization played in the emergence of the first bronze-using societies in south China and the importance of bronze studies in the training of Chinese art historians.

The contributors are Robert Bagley, John Baines, Maggie Bickford, Rod Campbell, Li Yung-ti, Robin McNeal, Kyle Steinke, Wang Haicheng, and Zhang Changping.

The goddess Guanyin began in India as the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, originally a male deity. He gradually became indigenized as a female deity in China over the span of nearly a millennium. By the Ming (1358-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) periods, Guanyin had become the most popular female deity in China. In Becoming Guanyin, Yuhang Li examines how lay Buddhist women in late imperial China forged a connection with the subject of their devotion, arguing that women used their own bodies to echo that of Guanyin. Li focuses on the power of material things to enable women to access religious experience and transcendence. In particular, she examines how secular Buddhist women expressed mimetic devotion and pursued religious salvation through creative depictions of Guanyin in different media such as painting and embroidery and through bodily portrayals of the deity using jewelry and dance. These material displays expressed a worldview that differed from yet fit within the Confucian patriarchal system. Attending to the fabrication and use of "women's things" by secular women, Li offers new insight into the relationships between worshipped and worshipper in Buddhist practice. Combining empirical research with theoretical insights from both art history and Buddhist studies, Becoming Guanyin is a field-changing analysis that reveals the interplay between material culture, religion, and their gendered transformations.

Beautifully illustrated with an array of Chinese art, this book offers a closer look at the rich variety of styles, decoration, motifs and patterns - and the sheer craftsmanship - of Chinese culture. The book is arranged thematically and opens by taking a look at the essential nature and meaning of Chinese art. Chapters that follow place the objects and designs into their cultural context. Each of the intriguing and beautiful artworks is then explored further with amazing close-up views, allowing the reader to get even closer than a behind-the-scenes museum or gallery tour. By showing the complete artwork alongside a detail, the authors provide a fresh view of each object which often allows intriguing comparisons between seemingly unrelated objects and media. The selection of art and details evoke the hand and eye of the most talented Chinese craftsmen past and present. Ideal as a spur to creative inspiration or as souvenir or introduction to a museum visit, this stunning book offers an alternative view of the wide range of Chinese art. The book highlights in close-up and gorgeous colour the most breathtaking aspects of workmanship, materials and design found in stunning ceramics, lacquer, jade, metalwork, brush painting and woodblock printing.

This book introduces readers to the history of design thinking in pre-modern China. The content is structured according to successive dynasties, covering the seven major periods of the pre-Qin, Qin and Han, Wei and Jin, Sui and Tang, Song and Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties. Each chapter introduces the most representative individuals of the period and discusses their work and ideas in order to reveal the national and cultural features of the respective periods. A distinctive feature of cultural identity running through the long course of China's historical development is the argument that actions are determined by ideas: Such a view can be found in long-standing thinking on art, design, and creativity. The book demonstrates that conscious design is the vital link between the ideas that constitute human cultures and the physical objects that make up their resulting material cultures. It is the attribute of design that defines what it is to be human and also produces the physical evidence of the evolution of Chinese civilization. The book reveals the integrated characteristics of Chinese culture and art and shows how both changing and recurring ideologies have influenced Chinese design practice since the ancient Shang and Zhou dynasties and how these forces have shaped the spirit and materiality of Chinese civilization. Design is the cornerstone that has made China one of the major contributors to human civilization throughout the thousands of years of its history. Given its focus, the book largely appeals to two main audiences: an academic readership of students and researchers interested in cultural studies and, a more general one, consisting of those interested in international comparisons and wishing to learn more about Chinese history, society, and culture. In order to appeal to both, the book is written in a clear and accessible language.

From starry-eyed fans with dreams of fame to cotton entrepreneurs turned movie moguls, the Bombay film industry has historically energized a range of practices and practitioners, playing a crucial and compelling role in the life of modern India. Bombay Hustle presents an ambitious history of Indian cinema as a history of material practice, bringing new insights to studies of media, modernity, and the late colonial city. Drawing on original archival research and an innovative transdisciplinary approach, Debashree Mukherjee offers a panoramic portrait of the consolidation of the Bombay film industry during the talkie transition of the 1920s-1940s. In the decades leading up to independence in 1947, Bombay became synonymous with marketplace thrills, industrial strikes, and modernist experimentation. Its burgeoning film industry embodied Bombay's spirit of "hustle," gathering together and spewing out the many different energies and emotions that characterized the city. Bombay Hustle examines diverse sites of film production-finance, pre-production paperwork, casting, screenwriting, acting, stunts-to show how speculative excitement jostled against desires for scientific management in an industry premised on the struggle between contingency and control. Mukherjee develops the concept of a "cine-ecology" in order to examine the bodies, technologies, and environments that collectively shaped the production and circulation of cinematic meaning in this time. The book thus brings into view a range of marginalized film workers, their labor and experiences; forgotten film studios, their technical practices and aesthetic visions; and overlooked connections among media practices, geographical particularities, and historical exigencies.

The offering of gifts is a practice nearly as ancient and widespread as human culture itself. At courts throughout the Islamic world, the exchange of lavish gifts and endowments intimately linked art with diplomacy and royal ambitions, religion, and personal relationships. This beautifully illustrated book explores the complex interplay between artistic production and gift-based patronage by discussing works of great aesthetic refinement that were either commissioned or repurposed as gifts. By tracing the unique histories of certain artworks, the author reveals how the exchange of luxury objects was central to the circulation, emulation, and assimilation of artistic forms both within and beyond the Islamic world. The catalogue features seventy illustrations of artworks from the 8th to the 20th century. These include some of the most beautiful and least-known objects from the Islamic world, such as jewelry, armor and weaponry, enormous and ornate carpets, and illustrated copies of the Qur'an. Distributed for the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha, in association with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Exhibition Schedule: Museum of Islamic Art, Doha(03/19/12-06/02/12)

Ein erster Untersuchungsgegenstand dieses Buches sind die Vorstellungen, was die Renaissance sei, wie sie von Autoren des Zeitalters selber stammen und aus der spateren Forschung. Ausserdem wird eine UEbersicht uber die dominierenden Motive angelegt, die sich im Renaissance-Schrifttum nachweisen lassen. Der Abschnitt "die Renaissance als literarisches Motiv" ist der Renaissance-Rezeption vom 17. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert gewidmet, dessen Kennzeichen der Gegensatz der affirmierenden und der negierenden Renaissance-Rezeption ist. Die 'Revolutionen des Geistes' und ihnen verwandte Bewegungen erklarten sich gern zu Erben der Renaissance, wohingegen die Verfechter des Konservatismus aller Art sich der Renaissance entgegenstemmten und in Ablehnung der mit ihr aufgekommenen Ansichten einander uberboten.

Chinese Buddhist wooden sculptures of Water-moon Guanyin, a Bodhisattva sitting in a leisurely reclining pose on a rocky throne, are housed in Western collections and are thus removed from their original context(s). Not only are most of them of unknown origin, but also do lack a precise date. Tracing their sources is moreover difficult because of the scant information provided by art dealers in previous periods. Thus, only preliminary investigations into their stylistic development and technical features have been made so far. Moreover, until recently none of the Chinese temples that provided their original context, i.e. their precise/exact/specific position within those temple compounds and their respective place in the Buddhist pantheon, have been examined at all. In her study, Petra H Roesch investigates these very aspects, including questions about the religious position and function of the sculptures of this special Bodhisattva. She also looks at the technical construction, the collecting of Chinese Buddhist sculptures in general and those sculptures made of wood in particular. She uses a combination of stylistic, iconographical, buddhological, as well as technical methodologies in her investigation of the Water-moon Guanyin images and sheds light on the Buddhist temples in Shanxi Province, the works of art they once housed, and the religious practices of the eleventh to thirteenth centuries connected with them.

Medizin und Literatur stehen in einem so wechselvollen wie spannenden Dialog, der in zahlreichen Studien des dem Philologen und Bibliothekar Hans-Albrecht Koch gewidmeten Bandes beleuchtet wird - von der altgriechischen Komoedie uber das Volksbuch von Till Eulenspiegel zur Volksmedizin und Erfahrungsseelenkunde der Aufklarung und weiter uber Klassik und Romantik bis hin zu Autoren und Diskursen des 20./21. Jahrhunderts. Andere Essays umspielen den roten Faden mit Seitenblicken auf Fellinis Antike-Rezeption, mittelalterliche Buchkunst und Sakralskulptur, Beethovens "Fidelio", Chamissos Langzeitwirkung und einen vergessenen Zuricher Zeichner. Die Linie setzt sich fort mit neuem Material zum "Netzwerker" Rudolf Alexander Schroeder und Einblicken in die aktuelle Architektur und Hochschulpolitik.

During the early modern period in Japan, peace and prosperity allowed elite and popular arts and culture to flourish in Edo (Tokyo) and Kyoto. The historic first showing outside Japan of Ito Jakuchu's thirty-scroll series titled Colorful Realm of Living Beings (ca. 1757-66) in 2012 prompted a reimagining of artists and art making in this context. These essays give attention to Jakuchu's spectacular series as well as to works by a range of contemporary artists. Selected contributions address issues of professional roles, including copying and imitation, display and memorialization, and makers' identities. Some explore the new form of painting, ukiyo-e, in the context of the urban society that provided its subject matter and audiences; others discuss the spectrum of amateur and professional Edo pottery and interrelationships between painting and other media. Together, they reveal the fluidity and dynamism of artists' identities during a time of great significance in the country's history. Published by the National Gallery of Art, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts/Distributed by Yale University Press