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Surveys of Japanese Art by Medium
Folk Art
For essays by the father of the folk art (mingei) movement in Japan - though
he preferred the term "folk craft" - see Soetsu Yanagi, The Unknown
Craftsman, adapted by Bernard Leach (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1972). By
far the best volume for text and illustrations (not only painting, sculpture, ceramics,
and textiles, but also lacquer, wood, and basketry) is Victor and Takako Hauge, Folk
Traditions in Japanese Art (New York: Kodansha International, 1978). For one
kind of picture, produced in the town of Otsu, the last station on the Tokaido
before Kyoto, see Matthew Welch, Otsu-e: Japanese Folk Paintings from the Harriet
and Edson Spencer Collection (Minneapolis: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 1994),
a catalogue of 26 pictures with comments.
Also useful is Mingei: Masterpieces of Japanese Folkcraft (New York: Kodansha
International, 1991), a handsome book illustrating (with very brief discussions)
158 exceptionally beautiful objects (textiles, ceramics, lacquer, wood, pictures
- including a few that certainly are not folk art, for instance ceramics by Bernard
Leach and woodblock prints by Munakata). The book includes a useful discussion of
the word mingei and of the craft movement (including its indebtedness to William
Morris) that Yanagi sponsored. Hugo Münsterberg, The Folk Arts of Japan
(Rutland, Vt.: Charles E. Tuttle, 1958) is another useful introduction. Kageo Muraoka
and Kichiemon Okamura, Folk Arts and Crafts of Japan, translated by Daphne
D. Stegmaier (New York: Weatherhill, 1973) illustrates many handsome objects. On
some of the chief contemporary craftspersons, see Masataka Ogawa et al., The Enduring
Crafts of Japan: 33 Living National Treasures (New York: Weatherhill,
1968). Finally, some specialized books should be noted. Toys of all sorts,
including kites, dolls, tops, and noisemakers, are illustrated in profusion, with
brief comments, in Kazuya Sakamoto, Japanese Toys, translated and adapted
by Charles A. Pomeroy (Rutland, Vt.: Charles E. Tuttle, 1965). On baskets,
see the exhibition catalogue by Toshiko M. McCallum, Containing Beauty: Japanese
Bamboo Flower Baskets (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988).
Many of the illustrated objects probably cannot be classified as folk art, but the
catalogue is usefully informative about basket making.
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