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Japanese Painting: Ink, Pigment and the Role of Empty Space
A broad overview of Japanese painting, from monochrome ink and gold-ground screens to modern nihonga, and how materials and empty space shape the look.
Arts and Crafts
Painting and Popular Art
Ink painting, screens, nihonga and the road to manga and anime.
Anime and the Look of Japanese Animation
A look at anime's visual language, from large expressive eyes and limited animation to its debts to scrolls, woodblock prints and manga.
Emakimono Picture Scrolls and Visual Storytelling
How Japanese emakimono handscrolls told stories in sequence, from Heian court tales to temple legends, and why they are compared to early comics.
Folding Screens and Sliding Door Paintings
Why byobu folding screens and fusuma sliding door panels became major painting formats in Japan, and how architecture, light and patrons shaped them.
Manga: Its Roots and How It Grew
A cautious history of manga, from early picture books and woodblock sketchbooks to Meiji satire, postwar story comics and today's publishing industry.
Nihonga: Japanese-Style Painting in the Modern Era
How nihonga emerged in the Meiji period as a self-conscious Japanese-style painting, its mineral pigments, its debates with yoga, and its later evolution.
Rinpa Style and the Decorative Tradition
An introduction to the Rinpa lineage in Japanese art: gold grounds, bold flat design, nature motifs and a tradition passed on by admiration rather than family.
Suibokuga: The Ink Wash Tradition and Zen
How suibokuga ink wash painting reached Japan, grew in Zen monasteries and Muromachi workshops, and what it values: brushwork, atmosphere and restraint.
The Kano School and Painting for Castles and Courts
How the Kano school, a long-lived family workshop of painters, served shoguns and warlords from the Muromachi period through the Edo period.
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