Pola Museum of Art
The Pola Museum of Art ( Japanese ポ ー ラ 美術館 , Pōra bijutsukan ) is an art museum in the Sengokuhara district of the Japanese city of Hakone in Kanagawa Prefecture . It is located in the middle of a forest area in the Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park on prefecture road 733 from Gōra to Sengokuhara. The museum goes back to the initiative of cosmetics entrepreneur Suzuki Tsuneshi, whose collection reflects his personal taste. There is an extensive inventory of European art from the 19th and 20th centuries and works by Japanese artists who were influenced by Western art. In addition, the museum shows works made of glass and ceramics as well as a handicraft department with cosmetic accessories.
history
The history of the museum is closely linked to the cosmetics group KK Pola Orbis Holdings, Inc. ( 株式会社 ポ ー ラ ・ オ ル ビ ス ホ ー ル デ ィ ン グ ス ). The company founded by Suzuki Shinobu in 1929 has dedicated itself to beauty research and beauty care since its inception. The founder's son, Suzuki Tsuneshi (1930–2000), developed a company policy from this, in which the goal is a non-profit and peaceful society and should be striven for by promoting culture, health and beauty. Against this background, the company's own institute for research into the history of cosmetics was founded in 1976 ( ポ ー ラ 文化 研究所 , Pōra bunka kenkyūjo , English Pola Research Institute of Beauty & Culture ), followed in 1979 by a foundation for the promotion of traditional Japanese culture ( ポ ー ラ 伝 統 文化振興 財 団 , Pōra dentō bunka shinkō zaidan , English Pola Foundation for the Promotion of Traditional Japanese Culture ). Since 1996 the Pola Art Foundation (English for ポ ー ラ 美術 振興 財 団 , Pōra bijutsu shinkō zaidan ) has been dedicated to promoting young artists and international cultural exchange. This foundation is also the sponsor of the Pola Museum of Art, to which Suzuki Tsuneshi has given his collection of more than 9,500 works of art, which it has gathered over more than 40 years. In search of a suitable location for a museum, Suzuki Tsuneshi came to Hakone, where, according to their own statements, the “beauty of nature should enter into a symbiosis with the works of art”. Suzuki Tsuneshi based the location of the museum on the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute , which he had met in 1953 while studying in Williamstown (Massachusetts) . This museum is also located outside of a big city and is embedded in nature. The construction work under the direction of the architect Yasuda Koichi and the office Nikken Sekkei lasted from April 2000 to May 2002. The architecture of the building was awarded the DuPont Benedictus Award in 2003. The opening took place in September 2002. Since the museum's founder died in November 2000, his nephew Suzuki Satoshi has been running the Pola Art Foundation.
building
The museum is located in a forest area in the Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park, characterized by 300-year-old beeches and mock camellias . The property in Hakone is on the road between the districts of Gōra and Sengokuhara. The building site intended for the museum was below street level and the planning envisaged a building that would fit into the landscape. In order to ensure the greatest possible protection against earthquakes, a funnel was built in the ground from several concrete rings with an upper diameter of 74 meters. The actual building is suspended in this round concrete structure, supported by rubber at 16 load-bearing points, whereby the two and a half lower floors of the museum lie within this concrete shell and only the upper two and a half floors protrude from this construction. Above the ground level, the five-storey building only reaches a height of eight meters, thereby achieving the goal of a building that fits into the landscape.
The museum can be reached from the street via a bridge construction, from which visitors can access the top floor, which consists only of a small entrance area. From here the way goes down escalators to the fourth floor, where the cash desk area, a bookshop and the museum restaurant are located. One floor below there is a lecture hall, an exhibition room, the museum café, a souvenir and an information stand. This floor, like the floor below, is arranged in a cross shape around the atrium with its escalators. There are four more gallery rooms on the second floor, which is already completely underground. The lowest floor contains the utilities and is not accessible to visitors.
collection
The collection is shaped by the taste and interests of the museum founder. It “unites” around 400 paintings by European artists of the 19th and 20th centuries with western-oriented paintings from Japan. In addition, the museum shows sculptures, old Asian and modern Japanese ceramics, works made of glass as well as historical and modern cosmetic accessories.
European painting
One of the earliest European paintings in the museum is the picture Head of a Man from around 1827 , a study for The Apotheosis of Homer , by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres . This is followed by the painting Hippocrates rejects the gifts of the Persian king in terms of time and theme . The two landscape paintings by Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot can be found in the collection, Girls in a Forest and the Return of a Small Herd of Cows . There are also two works by Honoré Daumier : Drinking Hunters and Three Citizens . Gustave Courbet , the main exponent of realism in France, is represented with the landscapes Snow Effect with Deer , Landscape with Rocks and The Waves .
The two sea views by Eugène Boudin, View of the Île Tristan, Morning and Shore and Ships at Daoulas, are already at the transition to Impressionism . The museum owns two works by Édouard Manet : The Students of Salamanca from the artist's early work and the Impressionist pastel Woman on a Bench from the last creative phase. In addition to the group portraits of M. and Mme Louis Rouart (study) and The Mante Family, there is a woman at the toilet by Manet's painter friend Edgar Degas . There are also several pictures with ballet scenes: In the ballet hall , dancers , two dancers , two dancers with arms outstretched and two dancers resting . The museum by Pierre-Auguste Renoir also has a larger group of works . You can see Arabs on donkeys , girls fishing for clams , La Coiffure , girls with bow hats , landscape near Cagnes , landscape near Essoye, early morning , the still life anemones and the nudes bathing young woman , resting naked woman with servant serving tea , after Bath and bathers .
The numerous works by Claude Monet in the museum extend over a period of almost 40 years . Although there are no portraits of this artist in the collection, the landscape pictures in the collection particularly illustrate the artist's artistic development. Even without the bright colors of Impressionism, the picture The Train from 1872 shows a northern French landscape with industrial plants. In contrast, the painting La Promenade , created three years later, reproduces the nature of the river landscape near Argenteuil . Similar motifs are the work Flowers on the Shore, Argenteuil , posted in 1877, and the island of La Grande Jatte a year later . The train tracks at the Saint-Lazare train station are from a series of train motifs created in Paris . The museum also owns Sunset on the Seine in winter , Sunset at Etretat and the countryside, Varengeville . The pictures Giverny , Winter in Giverny , Japanese Bridge with Water Lily Pond , The Pink Skiff and Water Lily Pond were taken at Monet's last place of residence . The cityscapes of Rouen Cathedral , the House of Parliament, the Pink Symphony and the Venice view of Le Rio della Salute bear witness to Monet's travels . The museum also has two still life Gladioli by Monet.
The collection includes characteristic landscape paintings by two other Impressionist painters. The museum shows Alfred Sisley's Bridge over the Sèvre , Watering at Marly , The River Loing at Saint-Mammes and the banks of the Loing, morning . From Camille Pissarro you can see the road to Eragny , the flowering pear tree near Eragny, the morning and the way near Ennery . This is followed thematically by the works Pontcharraud with Snow and Promenade with Robinson by Armand Guillaumin and Sheep under Trees by Gustave de Smet . The works of Gustave Loiseau's Der Fluss Oise bei Pontoise , Pontoise , Der Flus Sausseron , Nesles-la Vallée , Overcast Weather, Nesles-la-Vallée and by Henri Martin Marie-Louises Haus, Labastiede-du-Vert , Paris already belong to Late Impressionism in snow , bridge near Labastiede-du-Vert , landscape near Luzech and Dorfstrasse as well as Henri Le Sidan 's still life The Three Roses .
The works of pointillism include Ebbe bei Grandcamp by Georges Seurat , Docks and Bridge by Auxerre by Paul Signac , Forest Scene by Henri Edmond Cross, as well as Naked, Combing Hair and Reclining Nude in the Grass by Hippolyte Petitjean . Works by Paul Cézanne can be seen from very different phases . In addition to a religious scene from the early 1860s, there are houses in Auvers-sur-Oise , Portrait de Antony Valabregue , Four Bathers and Landscape in Provence from the 1870s . There is also a still life from the late 1880s and a Harlequin, as well as still life with a bottle and still life with a sugar bowl and pears from the 1890s .
By Vincent van Gogh still life are in the collection vase with thistles , the landscape Pont de Gleize at Arles and the oil study tufts of grass to be seen. In addition, Paul Gauguin created the pictures The White Tablecloth, Pension Gloaner and Waldweg as well as the South Sea motifs Exotic Eva and Landscape with three huts and a dog . The museum owns the Breton landscape paintings by Gauguin's friend Henry Moret , View of Loqueltas and The Bay of Saint Thamec, Finistère . The motifs for the paintings by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Portrait of a Prostitute , Im Moulin de la Galette and a dancer in her cloakroom, come from the Parisian nightlife .
For symbolism of works belongs a group of the painter Odilon Redon . In addition to still lifes such as anemones , flowers in Japanese vases and still lifes with flowers and fruits , there are landscapes such as sea views in Brittany , sailing boats , and landscapes in Brittany . In addition, mythological images such as Icarus , The Birth of Venus and The Chariot of Apollo can be seen. The museum also has several works by Henri Rousseau , one of the main exponents of naive art . In addition to well-known jungle motifs such as Eve in the Garden of Eden and the lion in the jungle , there are mainly landscapes from Paris and the surrounding area such as Charenton-le-Pont , a landscape with an airship and double-decker , The Moulin d'Alfort , a view of the Eiffel Tower and the Trocadero, and an oil sketch to Vue du Parc Montsouris (The Kiosk) . Another view of Paris in the collection is Rue Chappe by Maurice Utrillo . More landscape pictures are sent by Albert Marquet : Place du Carrousel, Pars , road to Telemly , Palais Consulaire in Algiers , Hafenansicht Algiers , harbor view Boulogne-sur-Mer and winter sun, Paris .
Other works in the museum include Head of a Boy by Eugène Carrière , Self-Portrait with Dog by Edvard Munch , Portrait de Valentine Tessier by Marie Laurencin , Crepuscule by Georges Rouault and a self-portrait of the native Japanese Tsuguharu Foujita . Works by other foreigners living in France can also be seen in the collection. For example, by Marc Chagall, who comes from Russia, the pictures Dorfbäcker , Über der Stadt, Vitebsk and Ich und das Dorf and by Chaim Soutine the works Portrait of a Child in Blue , Peaceful Landscape and Girl in a Blue Dress . Jules Pascin , who comes from Bulgaria, is represented with the works Renée and Marcel , Girl with a Fruit Plate , Girl and Mother and Child , and the Italian Amedeo Modigliani has Portrait of Lunia Czechowska , Renée and Portrait de femme (Mme CD) . There are also pictures by Pablo Picasso from almost all creative periods . You can find the painting Mother and Child by the Sea from the Blue Period , a cubist picture of a girl's head with a hat with grapes and the classicist work Motherhood . There is also the child portrait Paulo as Pierrot with flowers and the painting Flower Seller , created under the influence of the Spanish Civil War . One of his later works is a Le déjeuner sur l'herbe, based on the model of Manet . The museum also has the Cubist Still Life with Guitar by Georges Braque , the landscape painting Chatou by Maurice de Vlaminck , a woman in the bathroom, Harmony in Blue by Pierre Bonnard , the interior painting The Artist's Studio by Édouard Vuillard and The Lute by Henri Matisse . The collection also includes the abstract painting Unassigned by Wassily Kandinsky and a small group of works from surrealism . These include People and Birds in the Night by Joan Miró , Invisible Sleeper, Horse and Lion by Salvador Dalí , Hector and Andromache by Giorgio de Chirico and The Passage of Time by René Magritte .
Japanese painting
In its Japanese painting department, the museum mainly shows works of art that were created under the influence of Western art. With the end of the closure of Japan , Japanese artists began, sometimes during visits to Europe, to turn away from traditional Japanese art and to take up the current trends in European art. The artists vary from adopting individual working methods to completely adapting the painting style and motif.
Asai Chū is one of the artists who have adopted the composition and style of painting from European painting . In his painting Plain by Musashino from 1898, however, he chose a hunting scene with samurai in his Japanese homeland as the subject . A similar subject is shown by Koyama Shōtarō in autumnal scene with riders in a village from 1890. The museum shows autumn leaves by Takahashi Yuichi in Takinogawa , around 1877, and the night piece cormorant fisherman from 1892. Various artists also preferred the western style of painting in the portraits however, their models in traditional Japanese clothing. Examples in the museum are the work Portrait of Reiko, seated by Kishida Ryūsei from 1919, which shows an interior with a girl, a kimono with iris flowers by Okada Saburōsuke , a Japanese woman depicted in rear view, or the profile of a woman by Fujishima Takeji , who in His painting, created around 1926–1927, shows a traditionally dressed Japanese woman in front of a landscape. Also in a western style, this time as a nude, Kuroda Seiki shows in Die Wiese from 1907 the naked torso of a woman lying in the grass with a flower in her hand.
Only a few of the artists who were temporarily active in Europe were impressed by classical European painting. Nevertheless, there is an occasional reference to this, as for example in the painting Naked in Rear View by Maeta Kanji . This work, created around 1927, clearly shows the model The Great Odalisque by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres in the Louvre in Paris . In the same museum, Murayama Kaita found the model for his painting See and Woman from 1917. He adopted the composition of a seated woman with hands in her lap in front of a landscape from the Mona Lisa - only Murayama shows his sitter in traditional Japanese clothing.
It is less possible to assign role models to the still lifes. In his still life from 1924 , Koide Narashige shows various vegetables, a candlestick and a crystal bowl on a table in the tradition of European painters, without this picture being assigned to a particular artist. The situation is similar with two rose still lifes in the collection. One, with a flower vase in a corner of the room as a motif, is by Wada Eisaku from 1926, the other is by Yasui Sōtarō from 1954 and shows the flowers in a vase on a table.
The Impressionism coined Japanese artist in particular. Two examples of this are on view in the museum, in which artists referred to the French Pierre-Auguste Renoir . In the painting At the Fountain from 1920, Nakamura Tsune shows bathers who also chose Renoir as their theme, and Umehara Ryūzaburō depicts a scene in Naked Women Hairdressing from 1928 that can be found similarly in Renoir's work. Another role model was chosen by Mitsutani Kunishiro , who shows the influence of Paul Gauguin in Naked Woman under a Tree from 1921 . A little later came Entrée de Rue du Chateau of Saeki Yuzo . The Paris cityscape, painted around 1925, is painted in the style of the pictures by Maurice de Vlaminck , whom Saeki had previously met. Another cityscape is Canal by Oka Shikanosuke . This 1927 view shows the Canal Saint-Denis in the style of Georges Seurat . Another canal view , Jean Jaurès, Quai de Jemmape from 1958, is by Ogisu Takanori . While most Japanese artists stayed in France during their visit to Europe at the beginning of the 20th century, some painters also made trips to other countries. This is demonstrated by the painting Cypress by Fujishima Takeji , who in this picture from 1908 shows the garden of Villa Falconieri in Frascati .
The extent to which Japanese artists took up the current painting of their time in Europe is shown by other works in the collection. The 1918 painting Village under Trees by Yorozu Tetsugorō is reminiscent of early works by Wassily Kandinsky , while Koga Harue's 1932 painting White Shell refers to Giorgio de Chirico . Also from 1932 comes Young Clown of Migishi Kotaro . Both the motif and the painting style were based on Georges Rouault , who varied the clown motif several times. 1938 was created after the bath by Kuniyoshi Yasuo , in which the influence of the Bulgarian painter Jules Pascin can be seen, who was friends with Kuniyoshi.
Due to the Second World War, the Japanese artists withdrew from Europe. Instead, some artists came to China, which was occupied by Japanese troops. Umehara Ryūzaburō, who painted Liyun in 1940, was one of them . The picture shows a woman with a fan sitting on a sofa while the Forbidden City in Beijing can be seen in the background . Also during the Japanese occupation, a scene in China from 1944 was created in which Yasui Sōtarō shows a Chinese temple complex in the sunlight.
European influences are less noticeable in Japanese post-war painting. Nevertheless, influences of the French Paul Cézanne can be found in two landscapes of the Hakone region, in which the Pola Museum is also located . For example, in the autumn of 1958 in Hakone by Kojima Zenzaburō , the landscape with Lake Ashi is reproduced, but a reference to the Montagne Sainte-Victoire in Cézanne's homeland is clear. Also in Berg Komagatake, Hakone from 1977 by the painter Nakagawa Kazumasa , the model of Cézanne is clear - especially in his painting style. In 1967 Takayama Tatsuo resorted to Paul Gauguin's painting style in his work An der Wasserstelle , while in 1972 he was more oriented towards Chinese painting in Dreams of Dawn . Occasionally, however, a European motif can be found, such as in Haus in Ribe from 1963, that Higashiyama Kaii created during a visit to Denmark.
Other artists discovered the charm of non-European regions for themselves. In the painting Water by Sugiyama Yasushi, for example, an Egyptian woman with a water jug on her head and the Nile as a background can be seen. The motif was created after a stay in Egypt in 1965. The collection also includes a painting by the same artist, Shimmering Water from 1992, which shows two water buffalo, one of which is an Indian woman. A caravan of camels and donkeys is the motif of the painting Journey through the Iranian Highlands by Hirayama Ikuo from 1995. Yasuda Yukihiko is one of the artists who combine various cultural influences in one work . In his interior from 1963 he shows a Chinese vase, a Persian ceramic plate and a Japanese mural. The museum also shows pictures such as Peonies (around 1961–1963) by Maeda Seison , which is more closely related to traditional Japanese art, or Teich (1968) by Tokuoka Shinsen , in which water lilies and a fish can be seen in an almost abstract way.
Sculptures
In the small section for sculptures, French artists from the late 19th and early 20th centuries can be found almost without exception. The museum has a Spanish dancer by Edgar Degas , who the artist made in marble around 1885–90. Degas' impressionist colleague Pierre-Auguste Renoir created the bronze sculpture of a dancer with a veil in 1918 . The famous sculpture group The Citizens of Calais by Auguste Rodin can be seen in the museum in a bronze version reduced in height to 72 cm. There is also a marble bust of Madame Nathalie de Goloubeff from 1905 by the same artist .
Emile Antoine Bourdelle can be seen with three works in the museum. These include a bacchant , a Parisian and a virgin with child . With a study in bronze of the female sculpture La France , the museum also has a work by Aristide Maillol . In addition to these works by French sculptors, the museum is showing two works by the Japanese artist Takamura Kotarō . In addition to a bronze work Seated Naked Woman from 1917, the museum is also exhibiting a study of a hand from 1952.
Works in glass and ceramics
In the glasswork collection, there are mainly two Western artisans from around 1900. The museum shows mainly colored vases and glasses by the French Emile Gallé , but also lamps and a small dog sculpture. The museum also owns several vases from the American Louis Comfort Tiffany , most of which have floral motifs in shape and color.
In terms of ceramics, there are mainly works from China. One of the oldest pieces is a clay vase decorated with cloud motifs from the early Han dynasty from the 2nd or 1st century BC. From the Tang Dynasty , the museum has a painted clay figure from the 7th century that depicts a dancer and an 8th century horse figure made from glazed earthenware. Several pieces from the Northern Song Dynasty are dated around the 12th century. Among them are objects made of glazed clay such as various bowls, a greenish vase with dark flower motifs and a white porcelain jug. Typical of the porcelain of the Ming Dynasty are richly painted works, of which the museum shows various vessels. White porcelain (vases and plates) with elaborate painting from the Qing dynasty is also included in the collection. The museum also owns some ceramics from Korea from the 12th and 13th centuries, the Goryeo period. The collection also includes works by modern Japanese ceramic artists, for example by Hamada Shōji .
Cosmetic accessories
A special feature of the Pola Museum of Art is the small handicraft department with cosmetic accessories. Here it becomes particularly clear how much the personal preferences of the collector Suzuki were decisive for the selection of the collection. The outstanding pieces in this department include several flacons from the workshop of Emile Gallé . These glass works, decorated with floral motifs, date from the end of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century. Around the same time, from the years 1903–1907, a series of silver items such as flacons, small boxes, brushes and mirrors by the English manufacturer Goldsmiths and Silversmiths Company comes from . Other items in this department are vessels made of Bettignies porcelain or Japanese lacquer work.
literature
- Arayashiki Toru: Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art . Pola Museum of Art, Pola Art Foundation, Hakone 2010, ISBN 978-4-901900-01-0 .
Web links
- Official website (Japanese, English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ The English-language name is also used in German literature. See Martin Schwander (Ed.): Venice, from Canaletto and Turner to Monet , p. 204
- ↑ Arayashiki Toru: Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art , p. 23.
- ↑ "study of beauty and beauty care" quoted in Arayashiki Toru: Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art , page 7.
- ↑ "Contribute to the thriving of a bountiful and peaceful society and to the advancement of culture through activities promoting beauty and health" quoted in Arayashiki Toru: Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art , page 7.
- ↑ ポ ー ラ 文化 研究所
- ↑ ポ ー ラ 伝 統 文化 振興 財 団
- ↑ ポ ー ラ 美術 振興 財 団
- ↑ "Symbiosis between Hakone's natural beauty and the works of art" quoted from the museum's website ( Memento of the original from May 20, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed January 5, 2011
Coordinates: 35 ° 15 '24.2 " N , 139 ° 1' 16.1" E