Buddhist Monk and Demon Statues at Boston Museum of Fine Arts
Kamakura flow (1185–1333 C.East.): new aesthetic directions
The earlier Insei rule gave way to an extra-imperial, although imperially sanctioned, armed forces government, known in Japanese as bakufu. Military machine leaders—calledshōguns—beginning came from the Minamoto family (whose headquarters in Kamakura gave the name to the period), then power concentrated in the (related) Hōjō family unit. Somewhen, the Minamoto and Hōjō shōguns lost their respective control to internal struggles, the pressure of other clans, and an economy bankrupted by coastline fortifications undertaken in response to two (thwarted) Mongol and Korean invasions.
This binary system of regime, comprising the shōgun's dominion and the (nominal) dominion of the emperor, significantly contributed to a shift in artful interests and artistic expression. The taste of the new military leaders was different from the aesthetic refinement that dominated Heian-period court civilisation. They embraced instead a sense of honesty in representation and sought works that emanated robust energy. This new evolution toward life-likeness and a form of arcadian realism is particularly evident in portraiture, both 2-dimensional and sculptural.
Left: Kamakura-flow portrait of a revered monk (Portrait of Jion Daishi, 14th century, ink and colour on silk, The Metropolitan Museum of Art). Right: Heian-menstruum portrayal of courtier (Segment of illustrated scroll of the Tale of Genji, 12th century, opaque colors on paper, Tokyo National Museum). Notation the difference in how the faces are depicted.
More detailed portraits of lay and religious leaders contrasted with the hikime kagihana (a line for the eye, a hook for the olfactory organ) practice of the Heian catamenia, while narrative handscrolls differed from Heian-period Genji-themed pictures in their intricately detailed depictions of historical events. In that location is no better example than the episode of the "Night Attack on the Sanjō Palace" from the Scroll of Heiji Era Events; here, the visual richness resulting from the imagination of the curl's painter(southward) makes the depiction appear brutally frank and viscerally impactful.
"Night Assail on the Sanjô Palace" (item), Illustrated Scrolls of the Events of the Heiji Era (Heiji monogatari emaki), second half of the 13th century, 45.ix x 774.v 10 seven.six cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Bearding sculptor, portrait of Buddhist monk Chōgen, 1206, polychrome wood (Tōdaiji, image: Wikimedia Eatables)
Unkei, Muchaku (Asanga), c. 1208-1212, polychrome woods (Kōfukuji, Nara, image: Sutori)
In sculpture, portrayals of revered monks reach an unprecedented degree of realism, whether modeled on the depicted figures or simply imagined. Sometimes the statues would have rock-crystal inlaid eyes, which heightened the immediacy of the figure's presence.
The sculptor Unkei and his successors, especially Jōkei, created Buddhist sculptures, carved from multiple blocks of woods, whose facial and bodily features expressed not only an interest in life-likeness, but also a sense of monumentality, sheer energy, and visceral force.
During the Kamakura catamenia, the confluence or syncretism of Buddhism and the indigenous Shintō deepened. Paintings like the 14th-century Kumano shrine mandala contain representations of both Buddhist and Shintō deities, divided into registers that illustrate the fusion of the two earth-views against the backdrop of famous sacred sites of Japan.
Kumano Shrine Mandala 熊野曼茶羅圖 (annotated), early 14th century, hanging scroll, ink, color, and gilded on silk, image 131.9 cm high (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Additional resources:
For data on other periods in the arts of Japan, encounter the longer introductory essays here:
A cursory history of the arts of Nippon: the Jomon to Heian periods
A brief history of the arts of Japan: the Kamakura to Azuchi-Momoyama periods
A cursory history of the arts of Japan: the Edo catamenia
A brief history of the arts of Japan: the Meiji to Reiwa periods
JAANUS, an online dictionary of terms of Japanese arts and architecture
eastward-Museum, database of artifacts designated in Japan as national treasures and of import cultural backdrop
On Japan in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History
Richard Bowring, Peter Kornicki,The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Japan (New York: Cambridge Academy Press, 1993)
Cite this folio as: Dr. Sonia Coman, "Kamakura period, an introduction," in Smarthistory, January 20, 2021, accessed April 27, 2022, https://smarthistory.org/kamakura-period/.
Source: https://smarthistory.org/kamakura-period/
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