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This publication shows how scholarly investigation of Japanese photography in recent years has entered an important transitional stage -- moving beyond its focus on new discoveries and descriptions of collections, to a more sophisticated investigation of photography in its historical and cultural contexts. At one time marginalized as either a practical technique or amateur art form, Japanese photography has now earned full recognition as a legitimate subject of scholarly inquiry. It is now being examined in terms of its aesthetics, technological development, and its role in the development of a national identity in Japanese art during the country's transition to modernity as well as in contemporary society.
About the author
Nicole Coolidge Rousmaniere is founding Director of the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures, Norwich. She received her BA (Archaeology, 1986), MA (Regional Studies, 1988) and Ph.D. (art history, 1998) from Harvard University. Her publications include:
Vessels of Influence (Duckworth, forthcoming), editor and contributor to
Hall of the Thirty-Three Bays: Photographs by Hiroshi Sugimoto (SCVA, 1997) and
Kazari: Decoration and Display in Japan, 15th-19th Centuries (British Museum Press, 2002), and editor of
Births and Rebirths (Hotei, 2001) and
Reflecting the Truth: Japanese Photography in the 19th-century (Hotei, 2004) with Mikiko Hirayama. She wrote essays and entries in
Japan's Golden Age, Momoyama (Dallas Museum of Art, 1996) and
Edo: Art in Japan 1615-1868 (National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., 1998, and
Jiki (Museo Internazionale Delle Ceramiche, 2004). Her research interests include, Japanese decoration, early modern ceramics in East Asia and trade networks, the history of exhibition and collecting in Japan and in Europe.
Mikiko Hirayama was the Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Fellow at the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures in 2002. She is currently Assistant Professor of Japanese Art History at the University of Cincinatti, Ohio. Hirayama received her Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh in 2001 having already published several articles, including 'Ishii Hakutei and the Future of Japanese Painting' in
Art Journal (Autumn 1996), pp. 57-63. Hirayama's research focuses on the study of modern Japanese art, Japanese photography, art criticism and theory.
