The Forgotten Japonisme: The Taste for Japanese Art in Britain and the USA, 1920s-1950s

In the study of the taste for Japanese art in the West, two periods have received major scholarly attention in the past. The first one is the period from the second half of the 19th century up to early 20th century, when Japanese art made a strong impact on Western culture and this is regarded as the classic period of Japonisme. The second is the period from the 1960s onwards, particularly after the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, when a new image of Japanese visual culture emerged with that of the Tokaido bullet train, Kenzo Tange's daring Olympic buildings in organic form and Yusaku Kamekura's clean and bold Olympic posters. These heralded an image of Japanese visual culture of sophisticated hi-tech modernity, which was underlined by further developments in fashion design labels, such as Issey Miyake or product design such as Sony Walkman.

These old and new Japonisme differ considerably, but what happened during the intervening period has never been systematically investigated. There is a tacit understanding that there cannot be a taste for Japanese art during World Word II, but this project is aiming to provide evidence that this was not so. Furthermore, even where there was hostility towards Japanese art, there is hardly any investigation of this phenomenon. We will also investigate such cases to reveal not only positive but also negative attitudes towards Japanese art.

This project aims to examine how Japanese art made an impact on Britain and the USA during the period between 1920s and 1950s. By examining a broad range of visual culture, such as architecture, craft, design, garden design, painting, print-making and sculpture, but also focusing on individual case studies, we will seek to achieve a new understanding of transnational interaction in art.

In order to achieve this aim, we have following six objectives.
1) To give a clearer picture of the taste for Japanese art in Britain and the USA during the period between the 1920s and the 1950s.
2) To gain understanding of how the taste for Japanese art affected the development of modernism in Britain and the USA.
3) To clarify whether there is any continuity between the classic 19th century Japonisme and the image of the post-1964 Japanese hi-tech modernity.
4) To trace and gain understanding of the vicissitudes of the reputation of Japanese art in Britain and the USA during this period.
5) To clarify the relationship between the taste for Chinese and Japanese art during this period.
6) To gain understanding of the taste for Japanese art by examining selected case studies in depth.

The case studies will include the British potter William Staite Murray, the British architect Wells Coats, early 20th century woodcut revival in Britain, the American designer Russel Wright, the American painter Mark Tobey, the Japanese-American sculptor Isamu Noguchi, the American collector and Anthropologist Frederick Starr and the reputation of the Japanese garden in Ireland, UK and the USA.

Four members of the Research Centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN) at the University of the Arts London are joined by two external experts, one from Japan and one from the USA, a Research Fellow and a Research Student. There will be three themed workshops and a conference for which additional external experts are invited.

The final outcome will be a book of collected essays, which will be aimed at the academic community of scholars and students of history of art and design of Britain, Japan and the USA, providing a new approach and understanding on this subject, which in our view fills a significant gap in current scholarship. It should also provide a tool for assessing transnational cultural interactions in art for a wider range of scholars and students including scholars of 20th century Britain, China, Japan and the USA in general.