Is There A Better Way To Classify Tsuba?

[kaigunair]

Hi Steve,  I am definitely not the person to answer this question, for so many reasons!  That's why I was asking the questions  .

 

But, as an example of what I'm coming across online using search terms like "is art appreciation subjective or objective" , here's a online course outline on art appreciation:

https://learn.canvas.net/courses/24/pages

with some examples in the section "M5":

https://learn.canvas.net/courses/24/pages/m5-how-we-see-objective-and-subjective-means

 

In trying to relocate that info, I stumbled across an interesting article on Flemmish art.  Though only able to briefly scan through it, it does seem there are many parallels between where the understanding of Flemmish art/artists was and where tsuba study is, and how a deep connoisseurship of a few helped to unlock understanding and appreciation on a vast majority of under appreciated works....

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/arthistory/faculty/Freedberg/Why-Connoisseurship-Matters.pdf

[cabowen]

I think there are plenty of tsuba that while not displaying the technical excellence seen in say, late Edo kinko work, are nonetheless highly valued for their artistic merits. Many katchushi and early tosho tsuba are rather crude in comparison and yet many of these are seen to contain the essence of what Japanese critics value most highly. You see much the same in Japanese ceramics. In other words, I don't think all tsuba highly regarded for their artistic expression are necessary also top examples of craftsmanship. I think it could be argued that certain Japanese aesthetics are almost "anti-craftsmanship" in a sense...

 

In any case, I am with Steve in that I find it difficult to imagine a way to qualitatively assess the artistic merits of a tsuba on some sort of universal scale.

[Soshin]

Hi Everyone,

 

Agree with Steve and Chris comments. Nothing much left for me to say on this topic.

[kaigunair]

Agree with Steve and Chris comments. Nothing much left for me to say on this topic.

Your most insightful comment yet.  Let's see if you are a man of your word.

 

Chris,

I have had similar thoughts about early pre-edo tsuba.  Basically, the current body of knowledge dates and classifies in a manner akin to some sort of evolutionary scale, somewhat like the following:

 

or

 

But its interesting you brought up Japanese ceramics in your post.....

[kaigunair]

Taking examples from other art genres, and argument could be made that the "simple" technical qualities of many tsuba were done deliberately, not because more advance techniques did not exist, but because of the feeling or message the maker wished to evoke.  For example:

 

[kaigunair]

or in figural sculpting:

 

[kaigunair]

and especially in ceramics, we see that there is a very deliberate attempt at less "perfection" and more natural abstraction as time progresses:

 

 

(If it isn't obvious, I have tried to place all pictures in the previous 3 posts in chronological order...)

 

 

[kaigunair]

returning to the topic at hand, it would appear that what one might consider "crudeness" on the part of pre-edo tetsu tsuba, may in fact have been a conscious on behalf of the tsuba makers, and, even more importantly, reflected the wishes of those patrons who ordered these pieces.  We know from studies of tachi mounts, temple bells, and bronze mirrors that the craftsmanship existed in 17th century Japan to make more realistic "late edo/meji" like pieces. So wouldn't it be very important to determine why such pieces weren't demanded?  (there is probably a strong connection to the earlier quote about mimesis vs allusion).

 

At the same time, moving into the early to mid to late edo, we know that the rise of the merchant class had a profound effect on the arts of Japan.  If we can distinguish between the differences in values and their corresponding effect over what constituted "beauty" by this group vs the momoyama bushi, it would go a long way towards shaping our study and understanding of what we could consider "objective" qualities of beauty held by each of the two very distinct groups.  

 

Now whether we personally like one set of objective standards vs another, that is definitely a separate discussion.

[cabowen]

No doubt at some point tsubako had the tech, materials, skills, and tools to produce work with great fluency of expression and could make either simple, monometal, technically simple work as well as the complex multimetal tour de force sculptures that we see later. But I do not think the early artists, say tosho or katchushi,  had the tech or skills to compete with the likes of the Goto or later soft metal artists. They worked with what they were familiar with...

 

Look at how sword signatures evolved. Most of the early mei are quite rustic. We do not see (at least as far as I know without data mining the Juyo Zufu), for example, fluid sosho mei in Kamakura era blades. I would think that if they were capable of it, we would have seen it somewhere...

 

I think we see a distinct development in tools, techniques, and materials through time. While I agree that tastes and preferences shifted through time, I think too that the palette of materials, techniques, and tools also expanded, allowing artists to expand the envelope of expression. In other words, I have to think that techniques and tastes developed together, perhaps in a symbiotic way...

 

One important reason these early blades and tsuba are so dear to the Japanese is because of their simple, natural, unassuming character, which appears to border on the rustic. They often contain a "naturalness" that later works lack. To again use the ceramics comparison, we find some of the most valued tea bowls to have been made by Korean potters for everyday use as rice bowls. They weren't made as "art", quite the contrary. These early swords and tsuba weren't either, in my opinion, but became, like the rice bowls, appreciated for their honest simplicity and naturalness. They harken back to a much different time...The Japanese 懐かしい, "natsukashii" is the feeling they stir, an almost melancholic longing for the past....They also frequently have that quality called 渋い "shibui", which Yanagi Soetsu called, "the beauty that makes an artist of the viewer". This is a very big part of the appreciation of these early works. It is a different beauty that what we see in later works where the technical virtuosity often grabs our attention first...

 

To try yet another comparison, think zen ga versus Momoyama Kano school painting....

[kaigunair]

I know its a bit delayed in terms of "internet time", but was gathering the thoughts to address some good points + life events have kept me away.

 

I agree that what we consider early tosho or katsushi tsuba should be considered more "dogu" or utilitarian things  that art.  However, at some point in time, we'd have to agree that tsuba moved from being dogu, a necessary piece of the sword, to a particular item where the wearer could signal his tastes and education, his "breeding" if you will.  I would submit this happened during the late muromachi and took off in the momoyama period.  Later on, tsuba were made as export items as well as items made solely as gifts that were not to be mounted.  By breaking up tsuba into discreet and distinct groups, we could more easily move from the generalizations and onto the task of forming a deeper understanding and agreement of the various aesthetics and values inherent in various tsuba.  This would be in contrast to just trying to place them into the "schools".

 

So to start, I would propose that the "naturalist-ness" of a muromachi or earlier tosho tsuba is much different from a kanayama or higo tsuba from the momoyama period.  Its interesting that chawan, the Japanese tea bowl, has been mentioned, because it would be a very easy connection to make between the aesthetics of chawan and the tsuba of the same period.

 

As an example, the most famous tea bowl from korea mentioned, the Kizaemon Ido, may be a perfect proxy for some of the conflicts I am finding with tsuba history and understanding.  There is the "official" history of the bowl, which, in summary, is that it is a common korean rice bowl that just so happens to have the magical wabi and sabi combinations that make it oh-so-perfect.  Then come are the nagging questions.  First off, its name, the Kizaemon Ido, is the family name of the merchant who first owned it...and what good salesman doesn't have a good story to accompany a piece.  Second, if this is a common rice bowl, where are all the other similarly designed rice bowls in korea?  I do believe that only recently there has been findings which confirm it is a bowl from korea, but given all the other detritus from dig sites and research into korean pottery, we would assume such common rice bowls should pop up a whole lot more.  Thirdly, the current research and consensus is that Japanese merchants directed ceramic production in countries such as China and the South Seas, importing these designed "art" wares into Japan, to sell to their wealthy or up-and-coming clients, who used them for the tea ceremony, meaning these were, in fact, all designed, art pieces.  So wouldn't a more plausible history of the Kizaemon Ido be that Japanese merchants also placed orders with Korean potters, and that the Kizaemon Ido was a built to order chawan?  So this esteemed chawan, far from being a common, everyday item, may in fact be an "art" piece, ordered and built to specs reflecting the tea aesthetics of the time, to be sold by a wealth merchant in his salon to a wealthy patron engaged in the very business and political oriented world of tea during the momoyama era.

 

What's most interesting is that since the 1980's, research into Japanese ceramics with tea bowls in particular, has blown away the traditional understandings of their histories which were passed down since the 17th and 18th centuries,  affecting such esteemed tea bowl "schools" such as raku and seto and oribe-ware.  Basically hard archeology via kilns and the stores these wares were sold in has shown that a great deal of what had been "known" about chawan is actually the result of astute marketing, while the truth is much more complex, fascinating and interesting. 

 

But returning to tsuba, in the same way, we seem conditioned to look at a pre-Edo, momoyama period tetsu tsuba, and think of the designs as "simple" or from the hands of less-skilled artists of the momoyama era vs those of the late Edo period.  I know I did.  But as I tried to show in the photos, in really really good tetsu examples, what we might first see as simplistic and quaint designs should actually be very high-brow abstract, even avant-garde type art design, occurring in 16th century Japan!  It would also be a bit unfair to compare the aesthetics of late edo kinko tsuba to momoyama tetsu tsuba.  However, when we compare Edo-period tetsu tsuba to Momoyama tsuba designs while holding the connection between momoyama tsuba to the same abstract and avant-garde designs of the chawan during that time, that is a good start at building a basis for judging and comparing the aesthetic qualities of tetsu tsuba.  

 

As a last example comparison with chawan, it is said that in regards to oribe-ware (which is more linked to a style than to a particular kiln or "school"), there is a definite dichotomy between the aesthetics of momoyama era wares and those of Edo, the former being bold and strong while the latter, perhaps being more "technically competent", lacking the same energy and vibrancy. If a similar parallel be can made with tetsu tsuba designs between the two periods, then perhaps there are other similarities between where the understanding of chawan was up until the 1980 and where we are with tsuba understanding today... 

[Steve Waszak]

Junichi,

 

Much of what you say here express ideas I have long had about the links between Momoyama tetsu tsuba and the dominant Tea Culture those tsuba emerged from and engaged with.  The highest of the high-end iron guards of that time I believe were designed via the "guidance" of top buke aesthetes of the day, men whose sensibilities were honed by being steeped (as it were) in Tea.  The particular concrete aesthetic details of the major wares of the period are simply too closely echoed in certain tsuba for it to be coincidental, especially given that we can point to specific individuals who would likely, if not definitely, be involved in both.  Hosokawa Tadaoki, a Momoyama man even though he becomes Daimyo of Higo in the 1630s, near the end of his life, was a man of Tea (documented) and is credited with essentially establishing the "Big 4" Higo tsuba-making entities (Hirata, Shimizu, Nishigaki, Hayashi).  Further, he is thought by some to have inspired/guided the design of some of the tsuba produced in Higo, and is understood even to have made tsuba himself.  As far as I'm concerned (and have stated numerous times, now), the link between Tea and certain Momoyama tsuba isn't even questionable. 

 

On the Kizaemon Ido bowl, yes, I have long wondered (found dubious) the claim that it was a simple Korean rice bowl.  Frankly, it displays a sensibility far too sophisticated---with too many subtle "touches" for a quickly "whipped out" rice bowl.  The hypothesis that it is the product of a much loftier aesthetics-driven intent and design is significantly more plausible to me.  So the fact that the archeological evidence has resulted in a "surprising" dearth of such bowls or their shards is actually far from surprising to me...

 

Two statements in your post caught my attention, though, Junichi:  1.  You say that it "...would also be a bit unfair to compare the aesthetics of late edo kinko tsuba to momoyama tetsu tsuba."  Why would this be "unfair"?  Unfair how?  2.  You say, too that Oribe ware is "...more linked to a style than to a particular kiln or 'school'," but my understanding is that Oribe ware is certainly a type of Mino ware, and that the overwhelming number of Momoyama Period pieces (or remnants thereof) come from a small handful of Mino province kilns.  Could you clarify this statement, please? 

 

Finally, you say at the end of your post that there may be "other similarities between where the understanding of chawan was up until the 1980s and where with are with tsuba understanding today."  I think this is a fair statement, but in using the word "understanding," this does not necessarily sustain the endeavor of classification, right?  I'm all for understanding, but remain a bit dubious about attempts to classify these things...

 

Cheers,

 

Steve

[cabowen]

 

As far as I'm concerned (and have stated numerous times, now), the link between Tea and certain Momoyama tsuba isn't even questionable.

 

I think it is safe to say that in certain circles Tea touched everything and later, it's influence reached everyone....

 

See here for some interesting discussion on the Ido tea bowls....

[Steve Waszak]

Thanks for the link, Chris.  Interesting reading, including the comments section at the end.

 

Cheers,

 

Steve

[cabowen]

Especially the comments at the end!

 

Seems ceramics are no different than swords, or any other antique/collectible when it comes to controversy.