This collection of six illustrated essays provides essential background information on the history of the Meiji period (1868–1912). Janet Hunter of the London School of Economics describes the drastic
changes brought by the Meiji revolution.
Sato Doshin of Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music analyses the Meiji bureaucrats’ efforts to promote the craft industries, and Hida Toyojiro of the National Museum of Modern Art investigates the motivations and working methods of Japanese entrepreneurs.
The next two essays, by Gunhild Avitabile and Ellen Conant, celebrate the lives of two Westerners, the German Gottfried Wagener and the Irishman Captain Frank Brinkley, who profoundly influenced the course of Meiji-period craft industries.
The last essay, by Rupert Faulkner and Anna Jackson of the Victoria and Albert Museum, explores the formation of that museum’s extensive Japanese holdings during the 1870s and 1880s.
This volume will serve as an invaluable starting-point for the further study of the Meiji period and its art.
The late Dr Oliver Impey – Senior Curator, Ashmolean Museum; Reader in Japanese Art, University of Oxford
Malcolm Fairley – Formerly of Sotheby’s and Barry Davies Oriental Art; now co-owner of the Asian Art Gallery, London
Dr Gunhild Avitable – Director of the Japan Society Gallery, New York; former Curator of Far Eastern Art, Museum of Applied Art in Frankfurt-am-Main
Ellen P. Conant – Independent art historian, New York
Dr Rupert Faulkner – Senior Curator, Japan, Asian Department, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Hida Toyojiro – President, Akita University of Arts; Curator, Crafts Gallery, National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
Dr Janet Hunter – Saji Professor of Economic History, London School of Economics
Anna Jackson – Keeper of the Asian Department, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Sato Doshin – Former Professor of Japanese art history, Faculty of Fine Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts
210 pages; fully illustrated in colour; 40 x 30 cm; hardback with slipcase; 1995; ISBN: 978-1-874780-01-4
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