Japanese Art at the Ukrainian Society

This is Asia week in New York City, and in honor of the occasion the Japanese Art Dealers Association (JADA) held an exhibit at the Ukrainian Society on Fifth Avenue at 79th Street.  Represented were Sebastian Izzard LLC Asian Art, Leighton R. Longhi, Inc. Oriental Fine Art, Mika Gallery, Erik Thomsen Asian Art and Koichi Yanagi Oriental Fine Arts.  I went on Saturday to see the exhibit and was deeply impressed by the quality of artwork shown.  Many of these pieces were priceless treasures of Japanese culture by some of that country's most famous artists.

This was a relatively small show considering the number of exhibitors involved and took up only three galleries.  Still, there were a number of exquisite works on display that made the visit worthwhile for anyone with a serious interest in Japanese art.  There were important examples of sculpture, ceramics, textiles, metalwork and lacquer on view; for me, however, the principal works of interest were the paintings and folding screens.

Of the paintings, the most exciting was a Muromachi period album containing twelve sheets of painting and eleven sheets of text done in ink, color and gold on paper.  Each small painting illustrated a different scene from the Genji monogatari placed beside the appropriate text written in old Japanese.  Even the paper on which the text was written was a work of art with an exquisite blue wave pattern at the top of each sheet.

Another notable painting was a hanging scroll by an unknown artist from the Edo period.  The painting, done in ink and entitled Amida Sanson Raigo, at first glance seemed to be no more than a faded line drawing.  Only when one looked closely was it possible to discern that the lines were in fact actually made up of thousands of extraordinarily tiny ideograms taken from a Buddhist sutra.  I still don't understand how the artist was able to paint such tiny characters.  It was a truly amazing accomplishment.

Other hanging scrolls of note were Owl on a Branch by Soga Nichokuan, Daruma, Priest Donrin, and Priest Eka by Kanō Tan'yū, and Mount Fuji by Yokoi Kinkoku (all from the Edo period); Hell Courtesan and Two Crows on a Branch Overlooking Asakusa by Kawanabe Kyōsai, Carp Ascending a Waterfall and Carp Swimming among Water Plants by Shibata Zeshin (all from the Meiji period).  The scrolls I personally found most intriguing, however, were three by the great Meiji period ukiyo-e artist Taiso Yoshitoshi - The Fox Cry, Faith in the Third-Day Moon - Yukimori and Kumasaka in the Misty Moonlight.

Of the folding screens, the most impressive was the Stations of the Tōkaidō Road, a pair of six-panel folding screens, each of them almost ten feet long, by an anonymous Edo period artist that traced the legendary route that connected the cities of Edo and Kyoto.  The amount of detail shown on these screens was staggering.

There were also three screens on display from the more recent Taisho period.  These were Pine Trees and Bamboo by Mori Tetsuzan and Nakai Rankō, Pine Trees by the Ocean by Kawashima Baikyū, and Cloudy Mountains, Lofty Eminence by Nishii Keigaku.

Unfortunately, the exhibit ends today, March 14, 2016; but one can still visit the galleries mentioned above to see the Japanese masterpieces they have available.