In Celebration of Nature’s Timely Blooming: Flowers of the Four Seasons in Japanese Art, Dec. 4 – Mar. 29

 

Cultural News, December 2007

 

 

Flowers of the four seasons: Trees and flowers representative of the seasons progress from right to left. At the far right, camelia and plum represent early spring, then irises, hydrangea, hollyhocks, and morning glories represent summer; pampas grass, and chrysanthemum represent autumn; and a snow-covered bush at the far left corner represents winter. By Saitō, Ippo, late 18th-early 19th (Courtesy of Clark Center)

 

Hanford – The Clark Center for Japanese Art and Culture at Hanford in the central valley of California, presents its winter exhibition In Celebration of Nature’s Timely Blooming: Flowers of the Four Seasons in Japanese Art from December 4 through March 1 (extended to March 29).

 

      This exhibition brings some color and life to the darkest season of the year by exploring Japanese artists’ varied uses of flowers as subjects in their paintings and designs. 

 

   While tracing the various flowers through the seasons, this exhibition also examines some of the major styles of Japanese painting, and their relationship with these natural forms. 

 

   Literati artists, for example, heavily favored paintings of orchids, plum and chrysanthemums (three of the “four gentleman” plants), often sparely rendered in ink alone, with a strong emphasis on brushwork. 

 

   By sharp contrast, artists of the Rimpa school took all manner of flowers as their subjects, stressing their colorfulness and lovely forms through pooled pigments and smooth, rounded stylizations. 

 

  Flower subjects also figured prominently in many of the other schools, Kano, Tosa, Ukiyo-e, Shijo and independent, represented in the show, as well as in patterns used on lacquers, ceramics and textiles, which appear as accents alongside the hanging scrolls and screens, showing how flower themes were used in decorative design. 

 

   Deep love of nature and careful attention to even its smallest forms and details are often mentioned as some of the noteworthy aspects of Japanese art. 

 

   In pre-modern Japan, however, there was no clear conception of (or word for) nature; rather than existing as something apart from the social realm, natural forces were treated as one with the human experience. 

 

  This mingling of “human” and “natural” leads to a starkly different appreciation of “nature” in Japan, with plants, animals and natural forms seen as part of the human order. 

 

   In poetry and in art, plants and animals became symbols for certain aspects, experiences, or types of human beings, and were organized according to a system of seasonal representation that only partly followed natural cycles of growth and bloom. 

 

  Moreover, certain schools or groups of artists favored certain natural subjects as more in keeping with their own values and interests, partly in reaction to their structure of patronage.

 

   In the winter exhibition, The Clark Center for Japanese Art and Culture brings some color and life to the darkest season of the year by exploring Japanese artists’ varied uses of flowers as subjects in their paintings and designs. 

 

   The exhibition will open on December 4, 2006 and close on March 1, 2008.  The museum is open Tuesdays through Saturdays, 1 PM to 5 PM and is closed on national holidays.  

 

    The Clark Center for Japanese Art and Culture is located at 15770 Tenth Ave., Hanford, CA 93230, (559) 582-4915, www.ccjac.org.