John Fleming Award 2009 - Report
The recipient of the 2009 JFTA, Olivia Meehan, shares her experiences of her trip.
The focus of my PhD dissertation is the European presence in Japanese painting of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. Of particular interest to me is the encounter between Portugal and Japan during this period. From an art historical perspective this subject presents a considerable amount of uncharted territory. In my research I aim to complement the European historical sources with Japanese sources, especially those yet to be translated and appropriately integrated into an art historical study on this topic.
Visual culture became a means of communication and an instrument of conversion for the Jesuit Missionaries living and working in Japan at this time. After the rather dramatic expulsion of all Portuguese merchants and Christian missionaries from Japan there is very little evidence of direct European influence in Japanese painting in both form and content. Instead Japanese artistic workshops focused almost exclusively on developing a specific ‘Japan Style’ in their works. However the works of so-called ‘Hidden Christians’ or Kakure Kirishitan during Japan’s Sakoku period when Christianity (amongst many other things) was banned by law, are still being discovered today.
I had two main goals in mind when traveling to Japan this term with the John Fleming Travel Award. The first was to spend time working with paintings by the renown Kan? School of painters located in the sub-temples of Kyoto’s largest Buddhist temple complexes and secondly to spend time in the libraries and archives at Kyoto University and the NCC Centre of Japanese Religious Studies, Kyoto.
Shunkoin Temple (a sub-temple in the Myoshinji temple complex) hosts a room of fusuma-e (painted sliding screens) known as ‘Kacho-no-ma’ or the ‘Room of Flowers and Birds’, attributed to Kano Eigaku. It is suggested that Eigaku painted ‘hidden’ Christian symbols in this room, a practice that is known in Japanese art history and yet rarely discovered and preserved. Given the generous assistance and support of the Vice-Abbott of Shunkoin temple, Rev. Takafumi Kawakami and fellow Art Historian Hillary Pederson, I was able to spend countless hours studying all four rooms of fusuma-e at Shunkoin. Needless to say this extremely kind and open invitation from Takafumi opened up a number of possibilities for me in terms of my research. Takafumi’s own engagement with these 450 year old paintings, their history and relationship with the temple, helped me understand their role and significance today.
My time spent at Shunkoin quickly sharpened my awareness of Kakure Kirishitan symbolism at other sub-temples in Kyoto. I discovered at least three other sub-temples with so-called ‘hidden’ motifs, the indicator being the disguised cross in the base of a stone lantern in the garden. One of these stone lanterns can also be found at Shunkoin, in which a carved image of the Virgin Mary was discovered on the buried section underground. Upon discovering these stone lanterns in the gardens of Shinjyu-an Temple, Zuihou-in Temple and Oubaj-in Temple (Daitoku-ji temple complex), an inevitable connection with the Kano School of painters or the shogunate of Hideyoshi or Nobunaga was made. First-hand study of works by the Kano School of painters that are only ever viewed within the temples (and often only with special permission) has been invaluable to my research.
The John Fleming Travel Award also afforded me a number of research trips outside of Kyoto. I travelled to Sendai, a city in the north east of Honshu. The first feudal lord of Sendai, Masamune Date, had a strong affiliation with Europe and even commissioned the building of a Portuguese style ship and arranged for an envoy to Rome to meet the Pope. In Sendai I was able to visit the extraordinary burial site of Masamune Date, the Sendai City Museum and the Aoba Castle. I also travelled to southern Japan, to the island of Kyushu. There I visited Fukuoka city, renowned for its foreign trade and encounters with Europe. Being based in Kyoto was also ideal for visits to collections and temples within the Kansai region; Osaka, Kobe and Nara.
I am indebted to Rev. Takafumi Kawakami for his support and advice during my stay in Kyoto. Thanks also to the NCC Centre for Japanese Religious Studies for their kindness in allowing me to access their archives and library.
None of this would have been possible without the John Fleming Travel Award. I extend my deepest thanks to Laurence King Publishing for their assistance in providing me with this experience. It has been a highlight of
Olivia Meehan, King’s College, Cambridge.
