スフィンクスと奈良の大仏： 明治日本の建築家、伊東忠太の埃及（エジプト）旅行 (In Japanese, Sphinx and the Great Buddha in Nara: Japanese Architect Ito Chuta's Travel in Egypt (original) (raw)
2022
In the 1880s, Japonisme was already a well established aesthetic trend in Western Europe when it began to reach Central Europe, more particularly Austria-Hungary. Born into a Polish family near Lemberg/Lwów (today L'viv in western Ukraine), capital city of the Austrian province of Galicia, Julian Fałat, then a subject of the now defunct Habsburg monarchy, came to Japan fifteen years before Emil Orlik and nearly three decades before Friedrich Capelari, all three of them from Cisleithania. He was indeed, in 1885, the first artist from Central Europe who visited Japan for artistic reasons. Together with his wealthy friend Edward Simmler, and thanks to him, he was able to travel around the world, and stayed for two months on this occasion. We have various memories of his trip: watercolour and pencil sketches, writings, travel documents and other items, most of them on display in his former house, now a museum dedicated to his life and work in Bystra, near Bielsko-Biała, Silesia (south-west Poland). He was above all a watercolour and oil painting master. Unlike Orlik and Capelari, he was not a wood engraver, although he has been inspired, like many others, by the masters of ukiyo-e, Hokusai and Hiroshige. Back in Europe, he developed his own interpretation of Japonisme. Beyond the typical props (kimono, uchiwa fans…) of his early works, many of his later creations, first and foremost the winter landscapes, reveal a profound understanding of Japanese aesthetics, especially in the way he expressed the relationship between Man and Nature in these creations. His Japanese experience marked him for life. He wrote later in his memoir “My admiration for Japan and the Japanese simply knows no bounds.” Appointed Director of the School of Fine Arts in Cracow in 1895, he was among the founding members of the artistic society Sztuka (the Art) two years later, together with Japoniste painters such as Leon Wyczółkowski, whom he met in Munich in 1875, Teodor Axentowicz, Stanisław Wyspiański and others. He was also in contact with the famous Japanese art collector Feliks “Manggha” Jasieński. However, among them, he was the only one who had a first-hand experience of the country whose art fascinated them. Quite famous in Poland nowadays, where he is considered as a national artist, he is little known, if not unknown, in Western countries, as well as in Japan. However, he is among the artists who were the most profoundly influenced by Japanese art and aesthetics during the golden age of Japonisme and for the rest of his life. Presenting Fałat’s Japonisme in Tokyo would be nothing less than giving his due to a great artist, who would deserve recognition in the country he placed above all others.