The Nihon Mingei-kan in Tokyo, a museum of folk crafts 日本民芸館

The beautiful in the useful

 

In 1936, in the district of Meguro in Tokyo, the writer, philosopher and collector, Soetsu Yanagi (1889-1961) eager to highlight the beauty of everyday handicrafts, founded the Mingei-kan, museum of popular crafts Japanese. The key word here: discover beauty in the ordinary.

 

 

 

The thought of Soestu Yanagi

In the mid-1920s, the Tokyo thinker, Soetsu Yanagi, defined the mingei artistic movement, which valued popular craftsmanship from ancestral traditions. He writes about it: "It must be modest but not junk, cheap but not fragile. Dishonesty, perversity, luxury, this is what Mingei objects must avoid at the highest point: what is natural, sincere, safe, simple , such are the characteristics of Mingei". This thinker was already known for his participation in 1910, when he was still a student, in the creation of the magazine Shirabaka around which the literary movement of the same name was formed.

 

tea_bowl_by_Shoji_Hamada

Shoji Hamada tea bowl

Courtesy of The Estate of Shoji Hamada/York Museums Trust via Wikimedia Commons.

One man's project

As early as 1926, Yanagi put forward the idea of creating a museum to promote mingei works . He then begins a collection of objects across the archipelago, guided by a specific objective: the search for "beautiful things". In this quest, he is interested in the unvarnished and unadorned beauty of handicrafts made by ordinary craftsmen, common men. According to the precept he theorized, he admires the beauty of everyday ordinary and utilitarian objects . Yanagi's involvement in the museum project is total. He designs the main building; from exteriors to interiors.

batiment-musee

The Nihon Mingei-kan

http://www.mingeikan.or.jp

bibliotheque-yanagi

Soetsu Yanagi's Office

http://www.mingeikan.or.jp

residence-yanagi

The dining room of Soetsu Yanagi's residence

http://www.mingeikan.or.jp

From all over the archipelago

Among the 17,000 works in the museum, which has been open since 1936 , are ceramics, textile works, glass, iron, woven bamboo, paintings, lacquers, wooden sculptures from the Heian period (794-1185) to the contemporary period; works collected throughout the country. The museum also highlights particular crafts of the archipelago such as folk art from Okinawa . Intricately woven costumes and carvings testify to the richness and diversity of the Ainu culture . In addition, it has an impressive collection of works by Kanjiro Kawai (potter), Bernard Leach (English ceramist), Shōji Hamada (ceramist), Shikō Munakata (painter), Keisuke Serizawa (textile craftsman); key figures in the mingei movement. The Nihon Mingei-kan, the perfect harmony of the beautiful in the useful.

 

costume-ainu

19th century Ainu costume

http://www.mingeikan.or.jp


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