Reinterpreting Japanese Collections in Museums

Human–Nature Relationships and Their Contemporary Significance as Seen through the Baskets of the Dai Williams Collection

This presentation examines human–nature relationships in the Japanese archipelago as revealed through traditional baskets, using the Dai Williams Collection housed at the Hearst Museum as a point of departure. Japan’s varied natural environments have fostered regionally distinct choices of materials and basket-making techniques. The Dai Williams Collection, assembled across Japan in the 1990s, consists primarily of back baskets and carrying bags made from as many as twenty different plant materials. These baskets function as mirrors of the archipelago’s climatic, vegetational, and livelihood diversity, while also embodying the accumulated knowledge and skills through which people have engaged with and utilized nature. By illuminating aspects of these human–nature relationships that have been rapidly diminishing in the modern period, this presentation demonstrates that traditional baskets—including those in the Dai Williams Collection—offer important clues for rethinking the relationship between humans and nature in the contemporary world.

The Japanese Basketry Collection at the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum: An Ethnoarchaeological Perspective

This presentation examines how we are informed by integrating recent Japanese archaeological research on Jomon basketry with museum collection data at the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum, exploring how these chronologically separated sources resonate with each other regarding the materials and forms used in basket weaving.

From a historical-ecological perspective, I consider what insights these datasets can offer about the relationships between people and plants across two distinct periods. Drawing on the Hearst Museum's basketry collection, the collector Dai Williams' notes, and recent archaeological discoveries from Japan, this presentation reveals aspects of both continuity and transformation in material use from the Jomon period to the present day.

Yoh TAKAO, National Noh Theatre, Japan Arts Council

OGAWA Haritsu’s Lacquerware Techniques and Their Legacy from Edo to Meiji Periods： A Close Look at a Hearst Collection Box (9-5685a,b)

Maki-e, one of Japan's representative decorative arts, is a lacquerware technique that uses gold and silver powder mixed with lacquer to create designs. Since its inception in the 8th century, it has been refined through a long history and used to decorate furniture, armor, and other objects for the upper nobility and warrior class. From the 17th century onward, during the Edo period, appreciation for these decorative items expanded to include Tokugawa shoguns and wealthy townspeople, becoming an unparalleled art form in the world. After the late 19th century, when Japan became a modern nation, it was exported worldwide.

OGAWA Haritsu (1663–1747) was active in Edo (present-day Tokyo) during the early 18th century as a painter, haiku poet, and ceramic artist. He was a lacquer artist who revolutionized conservative maki-e techniques, creating original methods and designs by inlaying ceramic panels, metal plates, stone, glass, tortoiseshell, and other materials into maki-e lacquerware. Many followers and imitators carried on his work, and numerous pieces made in the 19th century bear Haritsu’s name as maker even after his death. The Hearst Museum collection contains an excellently crafted box with Haritsu’s maker’s seal. In this presentation, I will discuss the appeal of this box by interpreting its design and comparing it with other examples.

Traditional Japanese Maki-e in the Hearst Collection’s Ujiyama Maki-e Inkstone Box: Subject Matter and Techniques

Uji in Kyoto is not only a scenic area of natural beauty, but also a place enveloped in a wealth of multi-layered imagery of aristocratic culture, religious faith, and literature. Paintings depicting Uji developed into the popularity of famous-place pictures (meisho-e) and “willow bridge and water wheel” compositions, and were eventually accepted as elegant Japanese-style craft designs as well. The Hearst Museum’s Uji Bridge maki-e inkstone box, which represents the Uji landscape by adding specific motifs within yamato-e (classical Japanese painting) expression, can be positioned as traditional Japanese decorative art.

Lacquerware with intricate techniques, symbolizing Japanese craft culture, has captivated overseas collectors. This inkstone box is one such collected piece, and I will describe its distinctive qualities.

Hizen Porcelain and Ceramics in the Hearst Museum of Anthropology Collection

The Hizen porcelain and ceramics in the Hearst Museum of Anthropology collection consist mainly of porcelain from the late 17th century through the modern period. Among Hizen kiln products, there are examples of high-quality porcelain such as Arita polychrome ware (iro-e) from the late 17th century to the mid-19th century. There are also polychrome plates from the peak period of Nabeshima ware. Furthermore, there is a set of underglaze blue square plates favored by Shogun Tokugawa Ieharu as represented in “The Twelve Preferred Types of Ceramics” (Tōki Juni-tōri) issued in 1774. When limited to the Edo period (through the first half of the 19th century), Hizen porcelain and ceramics in the Hearst Museum of Anthropology collection were those that were intended for the domestic Japanese market, with no examples intended for overseas export. These characteristics are common to Western collections assembled in Japan and elsewhere during the modern period.