Architectural Japonisme IV
建築のジャポニスム IV

1. Eric Mendelsohn:  Japonisme in Architectural Expressionism
2. Philip Johnson:  From Modernist Subtraction to Post-Modern Addition
3. Murano Togo:  Rethinking Post-Modernism's Origins
4. Robert Klemmedson:  A Japonisme Refreshingly Honest and Open
5. Paul Thiry:  'Father of Architectural Modernism in the Pacific Northwest'
6. Harwell Hamilton Harris:  'Japanophile' and a Case Study of Reality Unconfronted
7. Vladimir Ossipoff:  A Tropical Blend of Japanese Craftsmanship and Design
 

"Where observers have hitherto seen one stylistic tendency after another, each obliterating its predecessor and pointing in a different direction, now an inner bond can be discerned.  It is one that has been deliberately masked, in many cases; for artists have often been reluctant to acknowledge the existence of their 'Japanese arsenal'."

Klaus Berger, Japonisme in Western Painting from Whistler to Matisse,1992, p. 334 (Cambridge Studies in the History of Art)

Whether one calls it an arsenal, or otherwise a guidebook, a treasure trove or cornucopia of the imagination, the fact is: that Japanese art, artifacts, books, and cultural practices, in all their endless multiplicity of forms and ideas, produced in quantity and quality, have been a font of inspiration since the mid-19th century for many of the most acclaimed artists and thinkers in the West.   

When Japanese art was a novelty, known only to few, artists could openly sing its praises and sound original; after the dawn of the 20th century, almost 5 decades had passed since the opening of Japan, and every other bourgeois family now had a Japanese fan, porcelain, or some such object.  Too many artists had already paid it high tribute--thus it no longer sounded original to be inspired by Japan.  But what if it still was, by all measures, the best place for good ideas, the richest of artistic treasure troves?   

After ukiyo-e prints had seen their day, Western artists searched for new sources of inspiration--to keep for themselves.  Places like Kyoto or Tokyo had been scourged, and yet they still had much to offer; others looked to places further away, as to the north of Japan, to its folk arts, crafts, and architecture, or to other lesser known facets of Japanese culture--or so we propose here.  It is something that has already been proven to be true for many architects like Charles and Ray Eames, Charlotte Perriand, Walter Gropius, Wells Coates, Bruno Taut, and other self proclaimed Japan enthusiasts who were part of a wider circle of well-known architects.  

Whether it was true for Eric (Erich) Mendelsohn, that the reader can decide for himself after reviewing the circumstantial evidence below. These varied examples should suffice, but many more could have be added. 

What is particularly fascinating about Eric Mendelsohn, is his particular type of japonisme: his possible use of the 'kaoh' (which we will henceforth shorten to 'kao') as a source of ideas for croquis, that is initial sketches of the basic concept of the design.  The kao have been translated by certain museums as 'Seals of the Worthies'.   These are not, however, stamped seals, but rather signature-like personalized artistic designs, an identifiable hand drawn 'brand' added to a signature.  It was reserved for important documents and letters by emperors, aristocrats, samurai lords, high priests and the like.     

While the japonisme of 'monsho' or family or business crests is well-documented (the use of monsho patterns by H. H. Richardson and the de Stijl circle has been discussed in earlier sections of this website page, and luxury brand companies as Louis Vuitton are known to have incorporated Japanese monsho into their designs), no research has been done to date on the influence of the 'kao'.

Thus Mendelsohn's case is of particular interest.  It may be possible to match a good amount of his entire sketch portfolio with a limited number of kao designs.  That is to say, it is not as if there are an infinite number of kao designs available; the designs of the kao can be divided into several categories, and Mendelsohn's sketches as a whole also tend to fall into those categories.  He needed only to see a few books, at most a few hundred kao total, possibly less than a hundred. As the kao were employed almost exclusively by leading figures of state or religion, and because only the kao of famous or popular historical figures are usually included and repeated in kao collections, it is truly astonishing how his sketches can be aligned with those kao, not just by closely matching objective characteristics, but in a very intuitively satisfying way.   

Kao often appear to be 3-dimensional grounded forms, and those are often used as elevations in Mendelsohn's sketches; while those that look 2-dimensional, and are more abstract in shape, are used as plans.  The typology of his sketches, if you will, follows the broad categories of the kao in more ways than one.   Furthermore, it seems there were certain kao that Mendelsohn was particularly fond of, and would repeatedly use, creating variations on a theme.  The kao acts as a bridging image, making us see underlying connections between his sketches.  Take the example from the series following the Einstein Tower, comparing Mendelsohn and Mori Motonari, further below.  Both of Mendelsohn's images retain the same basic kao shape, but one image contains and emphasizes certain details of the kao that are left out in the other image, and vice versa.  Sometimes Mendelsohn's croquis look so much like kao, that it is hard to tell them apart without the labeling, as in the example of Mendelsohn compared with Oda Nobunaga and Asakura Yoshikage, further below.   

Mendelsohn's manner of drawing croquis is unique, to say the least, when compared with other famous architects, and that too adds to the plausibility of the 'kao to croquis hypothesis'.  Kao simply do not to fit well with the sketches of other architects; it is this snug fit of Mendelsohn's artistic foot in the shoe of the kao, so as to speak, that makes the hypothesis so interesting.  These distinctive shapes then, at the very least, are a useful tool in categorizing and analyzing the basic forms he creates.  Mendelsohn's sometimes seemingly nonsensical images also become less oblique; and his entire portfolio reveals a clearer unity, when considered from the perspective of the kao.

But there are still other reasons to believe the kao were likely known to Mendelsohn.  It is not just the forms themselves that are so strikingly similar, but the way his sketches were done: on small squarish pieces of paper, upon which he would draw tiny, perhaps a few centimeters in size images in the center of the paper--which is just the size and way most of the kao were printed, in the various small booklets they were contained in.  And despite the small size of his croquis, Mendelsohn often drew them with what seems to be a rather thick ended pen (as if with a brush--as in Eastern calligraphy?).  

After organizing and compiling the images below and the writing the above, this author came across the following extensive interview conducted by Susan King (University Art Museum, UC Berkeley) of Luise Mendelsohn, Mendelsohn's life-long spouse (who, among other things, introduced Mendelsohn to H. Freundlich, client for the Einstein Tower) :

"He read a great deal about architecture, and he also became deeply interested in Oriental philosophies.  He thought that America should turn away from Europe and look more to the Orient for its inspiration.  I know he liked San Francisco not only because it is a beautiful city, but because it is close to the Orient."                                                                                                             (King, p. 26)

As van Gogh had gone south to be closer to the Orient in climate and light, so it might be said that Mendelsohn had gone West to be literally closer to a key source of his creative inspiration.  However, though Luise Mendelsohn afterwards mentions China and India, as well as various aspects of European culture, but not Japan.  The same can be said of Eric Mendelsohn himself, from whom we hear nothing, even of the above, in his most widely published public lectures.  But this is odd, since the architects that Mendelsohn most closely associated or corresponded with included the ones most vocal in their enthusiasm regarding Japan, such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Henry Van de Velde -- the dominant avant-garde architect in Europe during Mendelsohn's early adulthood. Regarding Van de Velde, Mrs. Mendelsohn says: 

"Van de Velde was extremely important to Eric, and in fact Van de Velde came to think of Eric as his disciple.  Eric also felt this was true, that he was indeed a disciple of Van de Velde.  He was impressed by Van de Velde’s architecture, by his sense of design, and also by his writings.” (bold added)                                                       

Luise Mendelsohn in Susan King, The Drawings of Eric Mendelsohn, p.34, 1969 

If he was interested in Van de Velde's sense of design and writings, and he thought of himself as Van de Velde's disciple at the time, then how possibly could he not have understood Van de Velde's strong conviction about what he called "the sudden revelation of Japanese art" or the Japanese line being an "overwhelming revelation" and "salvation" as he had written as late as 1910? 

"It took the power of the Japanese line, the force of its rhythm and its accents, to arouse and influence us.  Its rhythmic strength and intensity could not but awaken even the deepest sleepers.  The wonders born of a well-judged balance between the subordination that can be demanded of line and the freedom that must be granted to it came to us as an overwhelming revelation:  it was like a sudden blaze of sunlight emerging from thick cloud.  The Japanese line brought salvation.  Its reckless courage and the boldness of its gestures, picking on the most unexpected moments to introduce an emphasis; the powerful, haunting rhythm that carries brain and soul along like the clouds of incense that rise to the Buddhas -- all this aroused our astonishment, and this strange astonishment fell on our reawakened longing for a fertility of our own like rain on the parched, yearning, concupiscent earth."  

Zum neuen Stil, ('Die Linie' pp. 181-95) in Klaus Berger, Japonisme in Western Painting from Whistler to Matisse, 1992.

Perhaps the omission of Japan, not only by scholars but by relatives, may again be due to the phenomenon, mentioned at the beginning of this discussion, of believing they are guardians of the deceased's reputation and originality.  While inspiration from ancient Greece or modern European masters is met with nodding approval, there are those who frown upon the influence of foreign cultures.  As Klaus Berger, one of the foremost scholars of Odilon Redon recalls, 

"When I asked Odilon Redon's son what were his father's precise Japanese sources, he bridled and declared: 'Mon père, vous savez, n'a imité personne, il était un artiste tout à fait original': 'You see, my father didn't imitate anyone; he was a totally original artist.' "

  Japonisme in Western Painting, p. 334, 1992  

What is clear, aside from the question of the kao, is that Mendelsohn did follow well-known Japanese architectural principles, in terms of plan, elevation, and interior decor, and that he frequently combined those elements in a single project.  Several of his final plans diverged greatly from his early partis/croquis; it seems that he often used the kao as a brain-storming tool, but would come to rely on proven Japanese architectural principles in his completed projects.  But that is not to say that there are a good number of completed projects that did retain the qualities of the kao expressed in the early croquis.

Let us first take look at Mendelsohn's most famous work, his Einstein Tower in Potsdam (1920), and compare it with the kao of some famous Japanese historical figures, displayed in many of the kao booklets.  It is postulated that Mendelsohn would have seen these kao below, or one like them. All the kao that relate to the Einstein Tower are post 1500 and some are from the 19th century.  From this, it would seem that one of the kao compendiums he viewed was one that included or focused upon kao from the Sengoku to Meiji periods.

First row: center Mendelsohn; left kao of Yoshida Shoin (1830-1859); right kao of Emperor Higashiyama (1675-1710).  Second row: left kao of Reizei Tametoyo (1504-1560); right kao of Emperor Go-Komyo (1633-1654).