Why Art Historian Karl Madsen was impressed by Japan
“The Japanese painters’ motifs are simple, according to our taste there is rather too little than too much in the paintings. A bird on a branch, a couple of mice, a plant, a fish is often enough for them.
— But we have never really known that the great was to be found in the small like the Japanese painters have taught us.”
(Karl Madsen, Japansk Malerkunst, 1885)
The same year that Art Historian Karl Madsen (1855–1938) published his book Japansk Malerkunst (Japanese Painting), the first of its kind in a Scandinavian language, his good friend Karl Jensen painted a large oil painting. It carries the Nature Morte. Som Baggrund en japansk Fremstilling af Ameterassus Gjenkomst (‘Still life. As background a Japanese depiction of Amaterasus’s reappearance’) and is one of the prime examples of Japonisme found in Danish still-life painting (fig. 1).
As with many other ‘japonists’ of the time, Karl Jensen (1851–1933) never travelled to Japan (fig. 2). In fact, his closest connection to Japan was through Karl Madsen, who himself never visited Japan. But Madsen was instrumental in promoting Japanese (and Chinese) art in Scandinavia and organised several exhibitions and wrote about the subject, thereby seeking to establish Denmark alongside countries like France, Germany and England (fig. 3).
Imagining ‘Japan’, a country I have never been to
He introduced Jensen to the world of Oriental – in particular Japanese – art and culture, and it was pieces from his art collection that Jensen made de the focal point of his still-life painting.
In July 1876, Madsen had travelled to Paris on a ‘Grand Tour’,5 where he met Parisian art dealer Siegfried Bing, one of the key figures in French japonisme. Madsen bought a significant collection of Japanese (and Chinese) objects from Bing, which he brought back with him to Denmark in the autumn of 1879.
Dating from around the mid-Edo period (1603-1867) to the early Meiji period (1867–1912), Madsen’s collection – a combination of antiques and souvenirs – included inrō, tea caddies, drinking utensils, porcelain, writing boxes, netsukes, musical instruments, hairpins, textiles, kakemonos, woodblock prints, books and more.6 Karl Jensen was spoilt for choice when picking which objects to include in his painting.
The objects depicted are now in the National Museum
We find both Japanese and Chinese items ‘randomly’ placed on a blue-greenish piece of silk: a pipe, a Chinese green-glazed ginger jar, four cups of Chinese export ware (one filled with tea to create a more cosy atmosphere perhaps), Japanese lacquer plates, an Imari vase, netsukes, okimonos, a teapot Yixing teapot and more. (close-up of fig. 1)
When going through Madsen’s collection at the Danish National Museum, which acquired a big part of the collection in 1888, one recognises specific objects from Jensen’s painting. The centrepiece giving the painting its title, is based on a large Edo-period kakemono depicting the sun goddess, Amaterasu, emerging from the heavenly cave after hiding from her brother (Ac641). In the back of the painting placed on top of a lacquer box with a few netsukes, is an okimono in the shape of a skeleton holding a snake (Ac.610). And there is the black lacquer tea caddy decorated with maki-e technique in gold with the Tokugawa mon (Ac597) (fig. 4).
An object hard to miss is the large black-glazed ceramic figure of Hotei (Aa105), which Madsen himself had depicted in a small still-life painting a few years prior, in 1881 (fig. 5), now in the collection of Skagens Kunstmuseer.
Jensen had also played with a Japanese theme in a smaller still-life from 1884, titled Nature Morte. Et rundt Japansk Spejl og andre Gjenstande (‘Still-life. A round Japanese Mirror and other Objects’). Unfortunately it is not in a very condition and therefore it is difficult to identify the specific objects but they would most likely also have come from Madsen’s collection. (fig. 6)
Japan’ and its influences, which have been depicted for nearly 20 years
In 1900, Jensen took up the Japanese theme once more (fig. 7). This time he depicted a samurai in full armour on horseback.
The etching was illustrated in the book Etnografien, fremstillet i dens Hovedtræk written by archaeologist Kristian Bahnson (1855-1897). The motif was based on a samurai and horse armour that also entered the collection of the Danish National Museum in 1888, with the horse amour being mounted on one of King Frederik VII’s stuffed Icelandic horses. Both the two still-lifes and the etching were included in a major exhibition of Karl Jensen’s works in 1916 (figs. 8-9).
Neither Madsen nor Jensen painted like the Japanese but their fascination for the art and culture of Japan – manifested in Madsen’s collection and Jensen’s depiction of these ‘treasures’ – represent a significant part of Danish japonisme in the late 19th century.
This article is an original text of https://intojapanwaraku.com/art/255821/
