Studio: international art (58.1913)

Studio- Talk

LANDSCAPE BY SHUKO

(Margins Inouye's Collection)

especially in old feudal houses. The Tokugawa
family has a splendid one in Nagoya, and the
Marquis Inouye is a great connoisseur, famous for
his rich collection of exquisite paintings and
lacquer ware among other things. Many such
names might be mentioned in this connection, but it
is a pity that such collections should be kept in
the gloomy godowns and enjoyed by an extremely
limited few on very rare occasions. Of course to
show any number of them involves much difficulty
and trouble, as they have to be taken out of the
godown and placed in a room without proper
facilities for display. Things such as a folding
screen, a kakemono or hanging picture, a makimono
or rolled picture, can be folded and put away in a
small space in the godown, but they take up much
space when exposed to view. Furthermore, it is
customary in our homes to hang a single kakemono
34°

at a time (though sometimes a pair, or more rarely
a triplet of them) on the tokonoma, a raised recess
in the guest room or tea-ceremony room. The
kakemono are replaced constantly by others, so that
the subject of the picture may always be suitable
for each season of the year. Even a great collector
will have only a few objects of art displayed in his
house at any one time to be admired. The fact
that the paintings do not ordinarily stand any long
exposure, as most of them are painted on fine silk,
has of course much to do with this custom, which
adds to the difficulty art students encounter in
making their researches.

It must be admitted that there has been a
prevailing tendency among Japanese connoisseurs
to guard their treasures with a good deal of secrecy.
This may have been the outcome of the customary
humble attitude they take regarding their posses-
sions. Inconsistent as it may seem, they have a
desire to avoid an ostentatious display of their
treasures on the one hand, and endeavour to
conceal the extent of their possessions on the
other. However, I am glad to note a growing
disposition to abandon this attitude. They have
become public-spirited enough to permit their art
treasures to be reproduced. Students of art owe a
debt of gratitude to such publishing houses as the
" Kokka," which in the magazine of that name
issues excellent reproductions by the wood-block
method; the "Shimbi Shoin," whose reputation for
reproducing old masterpieces by the same method
has been recognised the world over; and the
"Gahosha," which recently published in two
volumes collotype reproductions of the Marquis
Inouye's collection of Japanese and Chinese paint-
ings. By means of reproductions, which in not a
few instances almost defy the originals, art students
all over the world have been enabled to become
acquainted with inaccessible originals.

Our temples too are filled with treasures of the
empire, but there is practically no means of
showing them to the public. The need of better
facilities is keenly felt, and on Koyasan there is
serious talk of building a suitable and permanent
museum on the top of the mountain, where a
monastery was founded some eleven centuries ago
by the saint Kobo Daishi, and where some seventy
temples still remain to this day. These temples, in
spite of two great conflagrations, still possess
thousands of irreplaceable works of art. It is to
be hoped that such a plan may be carried into
effect. Harada Jiro.