A Japanese William Morris: Yanagi Soetsu and Mingei Theory

A Japanese William Morris: Yanagi Soetsu and Mingei Theory

Yuko Kikuchi

Yanagi Soetsu (1889-1961)1 was a philosopher and a leader of the Mingei move­ ment in Japan. Mingei literally means 'art of the people ', hence folk-crafts. Yanagi created Mingei theory in the 1920s. It was one of the first modern crafts/design theories in Japan. The Mingei movement developed a nationwide campaignfor the revival of folk-crafts from the 1930s onwards, its members united and nourished by a cultural ethnic nationalism. Mingei theory is essentia lly a set of ideasabout a 'criterion of beauty' in which Yanagi created a concept of the supreme beauty of hand-made folk-crafts for ordinary use, made by unknown craftsmenworking in groups, free of ego and of the desire to be famous or rich, merely working to earn their daily bread.2

Yanagi Soetsu was born in Tokyo, into a distinguished upper-class family. He experienced the turmoil of Japanese modernisation. His views reflect metropolitan culture, his upper-class background, and the complex struggles of the intellectuals of the time to find a Japanese cultural ethnic identity in anenvironment of overwhelming westernisation .

His life can be divided into four stages. The first stage is westernisation . He read vigorously and thoroughly absorbed western science, philosophy, literature and art. He acquired the most updated knowledge from the West, surprisingly without a big time lag.For example, he followed the current issues in art by readingmajor European art magazines such as The Studio. The Post-Impressionists' concept of 'primitive art'

was particularly influential. The Post-Impressionists ,written by C. L. Hind, published

in 1911,so excited Yanagi and his friends that they continued discussions 'every night throughout the week'.3 In 1912, he published an article, 'Revo lution in Art' which is a digest of Frank Rutter's book of the same title published in 1910, and in 1913 he translated Roger Fry's essay in the catalogue of the 'Manet and the Post­ Impressionists' exhibition held at the Grafton Galleries, London, in 1910. His translation appeared in Shirakaba (White Birch), an influential magazine which

concentrated, on Western art and literature4 of which Yanagi was a founder. He also absorbed anti-rational ideas during his ten years of intensive research into various branches of mysticism, including Christian mysticism, Sufism, Zen Buddhism , and philosophy, in particular, the thoughts of his contemporaries, William James and Henri Bergson . He was also fascinated by William Blake whom he first learnt about from Bernard Leach. When he was writing a book on Blake, Yanagi lived in Abiko, a rural area famous for its lagoon, and created there a sort of artists' and writers' colony with the ideal of 'back to the country', probably inspired by Tolstoy,the British Arts & Crafts Movement and the Wolpswede group.

Through his research on mysticism , he developed his interests in medievalism,

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gothic art and religious art. He read Emile Male's Religious Art in France in the Thirteenth Century (1898} and absorbed its aesthetic narratives of medievalismsuch as that treating of 'the beauty of the grotesque'. He also absorbed the idea of ethnic art with its emphasis on moral and religious purity.

At the second stage, Yanagi's interests shifted from West to East as he began to apply his now thoroughly absorbed Western knowledge to Eastern art. Hediscovered the beauty of Korean art and created his controversial theory of a 'beauty of sadness' which saw the characteristics of Korean art as reflections of itssad history.This sadness can be expressed in the shape of pots, in designs such as 'flying cranes and clouds' and 'willow and ducks', and in lines and white colours. This was his application of ethnic art particularly in the colonial context- Korea was a Japanese colony from 1910. This theory of a 'beauty of sadness' was later criticised inKorea as 'colonia l aesthetics'. During this application exercise, Yanagi also developed his concept of national and ethnic identity in art based on themodern Western concept of the nation.

After his involvement in Korean art, Yanagi turned his eyes to Japan, and his initial interest was in Buddhist religious art particularly Mokujikibutsu, wooden Buddhas which were thought to be carved by a travelling monk called Mokujiki Shonin (1718- 1810). It was while he was researching on Mokujikibutsu scatteredall over Japan, that he found folk-crafts in Japan. In 1925 he used for the first time in h is writings the term 'innate and original' beauty of Japan (koyuna/dokujinonihon no bi) in reference to M okuji kibutsu. It is a l egend that he coined the term Mingei with his potter friends, Hamada Shoji and Kawai Kanjiro in 1925 whi le travelling. Mingei is in fact an abbreviation of Minshuteki Kogei which means 'crafts of the people'. So in 1925 the Mingei movement began. Yanagi wrote what came to be regarded as the bible of Mingei theory tided Kogei no Michi (The Way of Crafts) and organised the first Japanese folk-crafts exhibition in Tokyo in1927. He aJso created a guild of craftsmen in the same year, which was similar to the idea of William Morris's Morris

& Co which I will refer to again later. In 1929, be was invited by Harvard University

to lecture on Japanese art for one year. His lecture series was entitled the 'Criterion

of Beauty in Japan'. This clearly articulated the innate and original Japaneseness in Japanese folk-crafts, and remains as the crystallisation of his concept of national and ethnic identity in art which was grad ually developed through his early studies on philosophy and Korean art. Mingei theory began showing nationalistic aspects more than craft aesthetic philosophy.

Yanagi founded the Association of Japanese Folk-Crafts in 1934 and published a new magazine, Kogei ('Crafts'). This magazine was published in limitednumbers

during the period 1931-1941, printed on exclusively selected Japanese hand-made paper with covers of hand-woven cloth and lacquer. It is one of the most beautiful book designs in Japanese book history. He and his friends such as Ito Chozo, Jugaku Bunsho and Serizawa Keisuke further developed their interests inbook design and printing, inspired by Morris, Cobden-Sande rson5 and Jean Grolier.6Then eventually in 1936, Yanagi established the Japan Folk-Crafts Museumin Tokyo, and this became the central institution of the Mingei movement, and still exists as such. The idea of this museum was greatly influenced by the Nordiska Museet in Skansen, Stockholm in Sweden, established by Artur Hazelius (1833-1901) as long ago as 1873. Yanagi actively travelled all over Japan, carrying out his research on folk-crafts, collecting, taxonomising, exhibiting and preserving.

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In the third stage, from the late 1930s to 1945, Yanagi developed his .interests in the crafts of Okinawa and the Ainu within Japan, and the crafts of Japanese colonies such as Taiwan and Manchuria . He extensively applied his medieval and primitive rhetoric and his 'criterion of beauty' . His political stance became increasinglyambiguous in his evaluation of the crafts of Japanese colonies and in his arguments over Japanese 'innate and original' beauty, which he somehow managed to develop in harmony with the ultra-nationali st ideologies, regionalism and pan-Asianism associated with Japanese Imperialism.

During his fourth and last stage, after the Second World War, Yanagi had close connections with a Buddhist scholar, Suzuki Daisetz. He developed Mingei theorywithin a framework of Buddhist aesthetics. His Mingei theory was first established in Western rhetoric but now completed in Buddhist rhetoric. He undertook lecture tours all over Europe and the USA with Hamada and Leach, and made a profound impact on Western craftspeople at the important International Conference of Craftsmen in Pottery &Textiles at Darrington Hall in 1952, presenting papers entitled 'The Buddhist Idea of Beauty' and 'The Japanese Approach to Crafts'. These twopapers were included by Leach in The Unknown Craftsman, under the same title for the first paper but the new title, 'The Responsibility of the Craftsman', for thesecond.

The hybrid nature of Mingei theory becomes apparent when examined alongside the ideas of John Ruskin and William Morris. Yanagi mentioned their names, but hewas a great self-publicist, and in his many writings he strongly emphasised the originality of his Mingei theories and their independence of any precedents. Many critics in Japan also supported Yanagi's claim to genuine originality and his views have not been seriously questioned until recently. His claims, however, need to be re­ examined against firstly, the backdrop of cultural nationali sm in Japan which became prominent around the 1890s and continues to the present day, and secondly in the context of the popularity of]ohn Ruskin and William Morris in Japan from the 1880s.

M ingei theory was created at a time when Ruskin and Morris were very popular. Their works were translated and introduced in various academic fields from the late1880s. According to my research, at least 102 items on Ruskin and 139 items on Morris had been appeared 7 before Yanagi published his own seminaJ work on Mingeiin 1927. In the field of art and aesthetics, lwamura Toru, a leading art critic, and Tomimoto Kenkichi, a versatile Morrisian designer and potter, are notable beforeYanagi . Tomimoto's article on Morris, published in 1912, was one of the earliest extensive pieces on the designer. Tomimoto also founded a design company in 1914,with ideas similar to those of Morris & Co. He later became involved in the Mingei movement and was at one time a very close friend of Yanagi, but his role in the formation of Mingei theory has long been neglected.8 A journalist, Murobuse Koshin also published three bestselling books in the 1920s that provided a digest of ideasby modern thinkers in the West with particular reference to Marx, Tolstoy, Ruskin and Morris. He also popularised the ideas of Guild Socialism.

Two Japanese critics who have questioned Yanagi 's claim to originality were a Morris scholar, Ono Jiro, and a Mingei critic, ldekawa Naoki . Ono said, 'in order

to truly absorb Morris's ideas, we Japanese need to critically assess Yanagi's activities and theories' ,9 and ldekawa claimed 'Mingei theory is a direct descendant ofRuskin and Morris' .10 In this country, Brian Moeran has also pointed out Yanagi's Morris connection . Itend to agree with Ono, Idekawa and Moeran.

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I shaU now briefly outline Yanagi Soetsu's key ideas of Mingei theory by comparing them with the ideas of William Morris as well as John Ruskin. Yanagi classifiedcrafts into four categories: 11

1. Folk crafts or getemono: 'unselfconsc iously hand -made, and unsigned , for the people by the peop le, cheaply and in quantity, as, for example, the Gothic crafts, the best work being done under the Medieval guild system'. Ge of getemono means 'ordinary' or 'common', and te means 'by nature'. It applies to common household objects and has a derogatory tone. It is a concept in opposition to ]otemono, artistic and refined objects of a higher nature, including Individual/Artist Crafts and Aristocratic Crafts in Yanagi's classification.
2. Individual/Artist Crafts: 'made by a few, for a few, at a high price. Consciously made and signed. Examples, Mokubei or Staite Murray' (Wedgwood in Yanagi'soriginal).
3. Industrial Crafts: 'such as aluminium saucepans, etc., made under the industrial
   system by mechanical means'.
4. Aristocratic Crafts: 'examples,Nabeshima ware in Japan under the patronage of a feudal lord or Stanley Gibbons in England ' {Makie in Yanagi's original).

Yanagi's theory was formulated on rbe first category. He prized getemono ,common household objects hand-made by unknown craftsmen. William Morris prized the decorative arts, which he called the 'lesser arts' in contrast with the 'higher arts'.

Their ideas share a modern aesthetic which contests the historical distinction of high

and low art, by prizing handcrafts by unnamed ordinary people.

Yanagi 's Mingei theory is centred on ideas of what he calls the 'criterion of beauty '

which defines the supreme beauty of folk-crafts or getemono. lt was most clearly summarised in a seminal book titled Kogei no Michi (The Way of Crafts), published in1927, and its essence was translated and adapted by Bernard Leach in 'The Way of Craftsmanship' in The Unknown Craftsman. Besides Kogei no Michi, Yanagi gives

an illustrated representation of his ideas in a series of articles with the same title, the 'Criterion of Beauty', published in 1931 after returning from lecturing at HarvardUniversity. It is not known whether Yanagi intended it or not, but it uses the same method as A. W.Pugin's book, Contrasts, published in 1836,contrasting the ugliness ofVictorian architectu re with the beauty of Gothic architecture. Yanagi's ideas were refreshingly new in the 1920s in Japan, when littl e value was attached to folk-crafts or getemo no, and largely overlap with those of Ruskin and Morris.

Yanagi's main project, developed from his medievalism, also has similarities with those undertaken by 'Ruskin and Morris . Yanagi idealised the medievalenvironment as one in which makers could create objects of supreme beauty. Both Ruskin and Morris were also medievalistS. The Middle Ages for Ruskin and Morris were a time when aesthetic feelings, social life and religious sensibilities were truly unified in an Age of Faith. Although the social system was hierarchical, everybodycould find a meaningfu l relation ship with society.

ln order to recreate a medieval environment in modem society, Yanagi established a guild to resuscitate craftsmanship. His ideas were influenced not only by Ruskin

and Morris, but also by the Russian Anarchist theorist, Pyotr Alekseevicb Kropotkin (1842-1921) in his book Mutual Aid, and by Arthur J. Penty (1875-1937), theBritish Guild Socialist and an architect, in his book Restoration of the Guild System..

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It would be most difficult without a change in the social system. Under present conditions folk-crafts are dying, bad factory products are increasing, and the artist­craftsman works for the collector...

In my opinion, now that capitalism has killed handcrafts,.the only way is through the guild system. The finest crafts of the pa st were produced under it... BeautifuJ crafts were the outcome of the co-operation between craftsmen.

Associations for mutual help and preserving order. Order involves basic moralicy.

The morality guaranteed the quality of the products. It gave the work its character, guaranteed its craftsmanship, and refused to allow bad work to be sold.12

Encouraged by Yanagi's ideas, the craft guild called Kamigamo Mingei Kyodan (Kamigamo Folk-crafts Communion) was established in K yoto in 1927 by four craftsmen. They created woodwork (mainly furniture), metal work, textiles and did interior designs. Their major works were exhibited in the Folkscrafts Pavilion at theImperial Exposition for the Promotion of Domestic Indu stry in Ueno in 1928. The Pavilion itself was designed by Yanagi, and created by the Kamigamo Ming eiKyodan. Inside the Pa vilion , Yan agi's collection of folk-crafts, and furniture a nd oth er crafts created by the Kamigamo M ingei Kyodan , were exhibited with theconcept of total co-ordination. This idea of total co-ordination is similar to Morris's Red House which was designed by Philip Webb with interior decoration, furnitureand other crafts by Morris's friends.

Ruskin founded the Guild of St. George in 1871, and under its name he carried

out various projects which ranged from craft guilds and land reclamation, to running a tea shop, and even road sweeping. However, in terms of craft-guilds, Yanagi'sideas have more in common with those of Morris & Co. and the guilds of Morri s's followers such as A. H. Mackmurdo, W R. Lethaby and C. R. Ashbee in the BritishArts & Crafts movement .

Yanagi, Ruskin and Morris certainly shared the same ideas. They all prized craftsmanship and hand crafts. They were all medievalists, having as their ideal a society in which art and mora lity were united. However, there are several differences, which I see as evidence of Yanagi 's originality. One of the most important of these relates to Morris's key belief in the idea of 'pleasure in labour'13 or freedom in creativity. Yanagi always spoke of a Divine power which he ca lled 'grace given by heaven',14 rather than of 'pleasure' and 'freedom'. A Japanese critic, Idekawa Naoki , emphasises Yanagi's belief that the craftsman was a 'human machine'15, destined forlabour-intensive repetitive work, who could yet unconsciously create beautiful things with the help of nature, tradition and Divine power. According to Yanagi, a conscious artistic faculty was a disease which prevented the creation of supreme beauty. For Yanagi, 'no-mindedness'16 was the key factor in making craftsmen free from this disease. Morris, on the other hand, while praising 'an of the unconscious intelligence', 17placed his hope for the future in a 'new art of conscious intelligence'.18 Inorder to attain 'no-mindedness', Yanagi emphasised 'discipline', relying on Nature and surrender to 'the Other Power' or Tariki, the reliance on the grace of Buddha, asopposed to Jiriki or the 'Self Power', attaining Enlightenment through

self effort:

[The Craftsmenl may be unlettered, uneducated and lacking any pa rticular force

of personality, but it is not from these causes that beaucy is produced. He rests in

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the protectin g hand of nature. The bea uty of folk-craft is the kind that comes from dependence on the Other Power ( Tariki). Natural mater ial, natural process, and an accepting heart- these are the ingredients necessary at the birth of folk-crafts•.19

According to Yanagi, relying on 'th e Other Power' actually means mak ers following tradition , using traditional methods , traditional natural materials and traditional formsand designs.

Yanagi and Mingei theory are widely known in the West, particularly for their so­ called 'Oriental' philosophic slant which gave a new dimension tO Western interest in issuesof crafts and craftsmanship. often come across favourable and uncritical acceptance of Mingei theory in the West, where there is a tendency cowards over­ mystification and anover-emphasis of its esote.ric aspects. However, far from being 'authentically' Oriental inoutlook, as is genera lly assumed, Mingei theory is a hybrid theory, highly eclectic inits concepts, with core ideas from many European sources, such as British (particularly Ruskin and Morris), Scandinavian and German craft philosophie s of the late nineteenthand early twentieth -century,and Buddhist rhetoric and ideas from Ja panese Tea Masters of the sixteenth and seventeenth-century. The purpose of this article has been toemphasise the hybrid nature of Yanagi's Mingei theory and to encourage a more critical assessment of its origins and aims.

NOTES

1 Japanese names are all given inJapanese order, i.e.surname first. Officially Yanagi•s given name is pronounced Muneyoshi but Iuse Soetsu by which be is more popularly known. Soetsu is the On-yomi pronunciation of the Chinese character for Muneyoshi.

2 Iwould summarise Yanagi•s Criterion of B eauty as follows:

1. Beauty of handcrafts.

1. Beauty of intimacy.
2. Beauty of use/function (functional in form and design).
3. Beauty of health (moral nature of makers and physical nature of objects ).
4. Beauty of naturalness (made with natural materials ) .

6. Beauty of simplicity (form and design) .

1. Beauty of tradition (method and design).
2. Beauty of sincerity and honest sweat (by unknown craftsmen, not for money

greed).

9. Beauty of selflessness and unknown (made by unknown , unlearn ed and poor craftsmen ).

1. Beauty of inexpensiveness.
2. Beauty of plurality (objects which could be copied and produced in large
   quantities).
3. Beauty of irregularity.

3 Yanagi Soetsu, Yanagi Soetsu Zenshu lCollected Works of Yanagi Soetsu], (Tokyo:

Chikuma Shobo 1981), I, p. 567.

4 ibid., I, pp. 706-716.

s Thomas James Cobden-Sanderson ( 1848-1922), printer and book-binder, also a

founder of the Doves Press.

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6 Jean Grolier, book collector, and associated with elaborate gold decorations of book-binding.

1. For Morris's reception in Japan ,seeK. Makino, C. Sbinagawa, S.lco, 'Nihon deno Morisu Ken.kyii Bun.ken Mokuroku' [A Bibliography Q{ Morris Studies inJapan], Morisu Matsuri eno Shotai, (Keyaki Bijutsukan 1991).
2. For further information, see Yuko Kikuchi, 'The Myth of Yanagi 's Originality: The Formation of MingeiTheory in its Social and Historical Context',Journal of Design History,Vol 7, No 4, (1994), pp. 247-266.

9 Ono Jiro, Kubo Satoru, 'Wiriamu Morisu to Yaaagi Soetsu' [William Morris and

Yanagi Soetsu], Graphicarion , 12, 1979, p. 3.

1. ldekawa Naoki , Mingei: Riron no Hokai to Yoshiki no Tanjo [Mingei: Collapse of the Theory and Establishment of the Style], (Tokyo: Shinchosha 1988).
2. Yanagi Soetsu Zenshu, op. cit., 8, p. 211.

12 Yanagi Soetsu, adapted by Bernard Leach, The Unknown Craftsman, (Tokyo and

New York: Kodansha lnternational1989) , p. 198 and p. 208.

13 May Morris (ed .), The Collected Works of William Morris, (Lond on:Longmans

Green & Co. 1910-15), XXII, p. 42.

'" Yanagi,'The Japanese Approach to Crafts', (Dartingron Conference Papers 1952), p. 22.

I S Idekawa , Mingei, op. cit., p. 70.

1. Bernard Leach translated this as 'state of going beyond all forms of dualism' in
   The Unknown Craftsman, p. 228.
2. The Collected Works of William M orris, op. cit., XXII, p. 12.

l8 ibid., p. 12.

19 The Unknown Craftsman, op. cit., p. 200.

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