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The Cultural and Art History of Kyoto

Lecture Series on the Cultural and Art History of Kyoto

Programme

Thursday, 9 June, 2016

Venue: Institute of East Asian Art History, Seminar Room 311, Seminarstraße 4, 69117 Heidelberg

Download: Adobe Poster

6.15 pm

 

Anton Schweizer
Tulane University, New Orleans

Island of Pleasure – Alterity and Space in Kyoto's Early Modern Pleasure Quarter

9 June, 2016 | Anton Schweizer: Island of Pleasure – Alterity and Space in Kyoto's Early Modern Pleasure Quarter

Thursday, 7 July, 2016

Venue: Institute of East Asian Art History, Seminar Room 311, Seminarstraße 4, 69117 Heidelberg

Download: Adobe Poster

6.15 pm

 

Matthew McKelway
Columbia University, New York

On Commission, Patronage and Transmission of "Sights in and around Kyoto"

7 July, 2016 | Matthew McKelway: On Commission, Patronage and Transmission of 'Sights in and around Kyoto'

Friday, 22 July, 2016

Kyoto: New insights into the cultural history of Japan's 'ancient capital'

Venue: Karl Jaspers Centre, Room 212, Voßstraße 2, Building 4400, 69115 Heidelberg

Download: Adobe Programme | Adobe Poster

10.45 am

Melanie Trede
Heidelberg University

Welcome and brief introduction

22 July, 2016 | Kyoto: New Insights into the Cultural History of Japan's 'ancient capital'

11 am

Matthew Stavros
University of Sydney

Monuments and Mandalas in Medieval Kyoto: Exploring the grand urban vision of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu

Discussant: Melanie Trede

12 pm

Timon Screech
School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London

The Great Fire of Kyoto: 1788

Discussant: Harad Fuess, Heidelberg University

1 pm

Lunch Break (lunch is provided for speakers and discussants)

2.30 pm

Anna Andreeva
Fellow, Max-Planck-Institute for the History of Sciences, Berlin

Daigoji Zasu Jikken (1176–1249) and His Disciples in Medieval Yamato

Discussant: Matthew Stavros

3.30 pm

Joshua Mostow
University of British Columbia, Vancouver

Poem and Picture in the Miyako meisho zue

Discussant: Judit Árokay, Heidelberg University

4.30 pm Coffee / Tea Break
5 pm

Cora Würmell
Conservator for East-Asian Porcelain, Dresden State Art Collections

Capturing the horizon: the ceramic sculptures of Fukami Sueharu

Discussant: Sarah E. Fraser, Heidelberg University

6 pm Break

6.15 pm

KEYNOTE

Hiroshi Takagi
Kyoto University / Ishibashi Visiting Professor for Japanese Art History at Heidelberg University

The Old Capital in Modern Times and Images of Kyoto

Discussant: Hans Martin Krämer, Heidelberg University

7.45 pm Reception
  Dinner for speakers and discussants

Abstracts

Island of Pleasure – Alterity and Space in Kyoto's Early Modern Pleasure Quarter

Anton Schweizer
This lecture undertakes an archeology of architectural and conceptual space in Japan’s early modern pleasure districts. It focuses on the Sumiya in Kyoto’s former Shimabara district. The Sumiya is the only high-end meeting venue (ageya) where courtesans interacted with their clients that has survived in its entirety until today. The architectural discussion will be contextualized with pictorial and textual representations of the Sumiya in prints and guide books. It will be argued that ageya architecture manifested pervasive otherness through employing excentric typologies, breathtaking material splendor, and multi-layered references to a cultural domain that was de jure monopolized by samurai and court elites. Ageya architecture thereby provided essential layers of meaning that have to be considered for a full understanding of otherwise well-known courtesan iconographies.

On Commission, Patronage and Transmission of "Sights in and around Kyoto"

Matthew McKelway
Ongoing debates among art historians and historians of Warring States-era Japan about screen paintings of Kyoto (rakuchū rakugai zu) have in recent years led to productive research on the origins, authorship, and purposes of these complicated images. While advances in archival research have clarified certain questions about individual works, documentary evidence alone has nevertheless left many questions about these works unresolved. The present lecture will attempt to present the state of the field of the study of the Kyoto screens and to demonstrate the potential of visual analysis to contribute to their study. Key issues to be examined will include the relationship of authorship and workshop practice, methods of dating the paintings, circumstances of commission, and provenance.

Monuments and Mandalas in Medieval Kyoto: Exploring the grand urban vision of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu

Matthew Stavros
Kyoto’s urban landscape was completely reimagined in the late fourteenth century through the ambitious building projects of the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu (1358-1408). This paper examines these projects, focusing particularly on the Muromachi Palace and the Kitayama Villa. The aim is to identify a grand urban vision and, more important, a guiding principle that inspired the warrior-aristocrat’s monumental aspirations. Several interpretations will be explored, including the possibility that Yoshimitsu imagined himself a cosmic ruler or devaraja, creating a capital emblematic of his transcendent status.

The Great Fire of Kyoto: 1788

Timon Screech
The great fire of Kyoto in 1788 is a largely forgotten event. None of the tourist information offered by the city today mentions it, with visitors encouraged to think of Kyoto as unchanging and eternal. However, the fire was monumentally destructive. Only fire or six major buildings survived, with the rest lost in their entirely. Of course, the modern city has expanded meaning buildings of genuine antiquity have been incorporated, but previously these were beyond city confines.
This talk will look again at the fire, at its effects and its cultural impact, and also the rebuilding projects that followed.

Daigoji Zasu Jikken (1176–1249) and His Disciples in Medieval Kyoto and Yamato

Anna Andreeva
The monastic complex of Daigoji located in the Fushimi district of Kyoto was a formidable ritual, economic, and symbolic institution that specialized predominantly in the study and practice of esoteric Buddhism. During the medieval period, its high-ranking clerics and scholar-monks exerted considerable influence on the political and religious life of Kyoto, greater Yamato, and beyond.
One of such clerics, Jikken 實賢 (alt. Jitsugen, 1176–1249), deserves special attention. Not only was he a prominent figure in the early medieval Shingon temple milieu, but his influence extended far beyond the premises of Daigoji and its sub-temples, Sanbōin 三寳院 and Kongōōin 金剛王院, where he occupied leading posts. For example, Jikken performed esoteric rituals for the safe pregnancy and childbirth of several imperial consorts and noble women residing in the aristocratic households of Kyoto. His disciples included not only ordained monks who went on to forge notable monastic careers, but also less historically visible but nevertheless significant figures who came to be known under the titles of shōnin 上人 (holy men) and played leading roles in the formation of vernacular esoteric and medieval Shinto discourses and practices in medieval Japan. Jikken’s interpretations of esoteric scriptures made an important impact on the intellectual pursuits of his disciples who transported his teachings within Kyoto and further afield. My paper will map out the impact of Jikken’s career on the religious landscape of medieval Kyoto and Yamato, paving the way for a broadening historical appreciation of this important but understudied figure.

Poem and Picture in the Miyako meisho zue

Joshua Mostow
The Miyako meisho zue of 1780 was the first of what proved to be an enormously successful “franchise” of illustrated gazeteers from the late Edo period. Meisho and meisho-e, of course, have a long tradition in Japanese literature and visual culture, but 60% of the Miyako’s meisho are temples and shrines, most of which did not have a history as uta-makura, or poetic place-names. On the other hand, the illustrations of meisho include both uta-makura and temples, and especially those of the former include poems. Yet sometimes the poems are inscribed in the picture-plane and sometimes they are not. This paper will attempt to untangle the semiotics of these differences.

Capturing the horizon: the ceramic sculptures of Fukami Sueharu

Cora Würmell
Born in 1947 as a son of a ceramic manufacturer close to the Sennuji-district, one of Kyoto’s more recently established ceramic locations, Fukami Sueharu is today considered to be Japan’s leading and most internationally recognized porcelain sculptor. His commitment to technical innovation and his artistic vision translates the essence and beauty of the artist’s Chinese Song-dynasty inspired porcelain oeuvre into contemporary pieces of art. This paper will explore the evolution of Fukami’s wheel thrown and unique pressure cast porcelain sculptures with their characteristic seihakuji (Chinese: qingbai) glazes. This delicate bluish-white glaze was already appreciated during the Kamakura period (1185 -1333) in Japan but has only been rediscovered as a suitable and challenging medium for contemporary ceramicists in the past thirty years or so. Fukami’s relationship with Kyoto as one of Japan’s representative ceramic production centers with its deep-rooted traditions, prestigious schools and research institutions will also be addressed.

The Old Capital in Modern Times and Images of Kyoto

Hiroshi Takagi
Today, more than 55 million tourists visit Kyoto per year, and, in 2016, the American journal Travel+Leisure nominated Kyoto as the most popular tourist destination in the world. The tourism discourse consists of „Kyoto characteristics“ based on a „national culture“ (kokufū bunka), to which The Tale of Genji, the Hollyhock Festival (aoi matsuri), the Phoenix Hall of Byōdōin Temple are part and parcel just as much as the „Azuchi-Momoyama culture“, characterized by the Rinpa School, the Gion Festival, and the splendor of (golden) panel paintings. These associations were, however, all constructed during the Modern Period.
In this lecture I will discuss the history of „Kyoto characteristics“, which were designed in Kyoto from the Meiji Restoration to the Modern Period, and spread from this city to an international community.

今日、京都への観光客は年間、5500万人を越え、アメリカの旅行雑誌『Travel+Leisure』は、世界でもっとも人気のある観光都市に京都を選んでいる。その観光言説、「京都らしさ」は、源氏物語、葵祭、平等院鳳凰堂といった「国風文化」や、琳派、祇園祭、豪壮な障壁画といった「安土桃山文化」であるが、それらのイメージは近代を通じて創りだされてきた。明治維新から近代への京都の歩みの中から、国際社会に発信されてきた「京都らしさ」の来歴を考えてみたい。

Verantwortlich: SH
Letzte Änderung: 13.06.2016
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