The formation of the Japanese Art Collection at the Art Gallery of South Australia 1904-1940 : tangible evidence of Bunmei Kaika.

Abstract

The momentous signing of the Treaty of Kanagawa in 1854 marked the turning point to end Japan’s long seclusion from the West. Its subsequent ‘opening’ unveiled the refreshingly different aesthetic canon of Japanese art which was enthusiastically hailed by nineteenth century Western artists and designers. As a much sought after commodity, Japanese art was collected in unprecedented quantities throughout Europe, the British Empire and the United States. The mania for things Japanese also reached the far-flung colonies in Australia and New Zealand. This phenomenon, referred to in the English-speaking world as ‘Mikado Mania’ or the ‘Cult of Japan’, coincided with the establishment of public museums, the proliferation of international exhibitions and ease of global travel. These innovations fostered and facilitated the formation of Japanese art collections internationally. A survey of Australian and New Zealand collections and a particular examination of the Art Gallery of South Australia’s collection formed between the years 1904-1940 reveal the circumstances and personalities that shaped the nature and content of the collections. It is argued in this thesis that while nascent colonial public museums and private collectors such as those in South Australia were guided by British tastes, the genesis of which predated the nineteenth century ‘opening’ of Japan, the collecting of Japanese art in nineteenth-century Australia and New Zealand served as a signifier of international discourse and modernity. For Japan, its art became a tool to fend off foreign hegemony. Driven by the slogan bunmei kaika ‘civilisation and enlightenment’, Japan throughout the Meiji era (1868-1912) exploited the mania for its art in order to achieve status and recognition as a world power. It will be further argued that the spirit of bunmei kaika also encapsulated the cultural aspirations of the fledgling colonies in Australia and New Zealand which, by the late nineteenth century, were endeavouring to articulate their own ‘civilisation and enlightenment’ within the British Empire. Through their efforts to advance onto the world stage, the Australian colonies played a significant, though unrecognised role in Japan’s experimentation and investment in its self-promotion as a civilised country. The cause and effect of measures undertaken by the Japanese government to achieve bunmei kaika through the applied arts of ceramics, metalware, ivories and lacquer can be directly demonstrated through the very objects collected in South Australia and the other colonies. A study of their intrinsic qualities and provenance provides tangible evidence of Japan’s strategic efforts to advance its national identity through art. It also serves to shed light on the curatorial expertise and connoisseurship being exercised at the time by colonial museums and collectors. Japanese objects acquired during the formative period of Australian and New Zealand museums have long been ignored or dismissed as hybridised and inauthentic. Recently their technological ingenuity and cross-cultural aesthetic have been more generously acknowledged. They are the beacons of Japan’s quest for ‘civilisation and enlightenment’.