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Kanagawa Prefectural Museum

KANAGAWAかな がわへのま な ざ し

2024/8.10 SAT >>> 10.6 SUN

Eyes
on

Eyes on KANAGAWA

Invitation to KANAGAWA*

KANAGAWA is home to tourist destinations such as Kamakura
and Hakone that still attract domestic and international visitors
today, but what was it like 170 years ago?
Under the foreign policy of Sakoku initiated by the Tokugawa
Shogunate in the mid-17th century with the aim of eliminating
Christianity from Japan, trade was allowed only with the Dutch
and Chinese, and the dispatch of envoys from Korea and Ryukyu
were permitted, but ofﬁcially no other foreign exchanges wereallowed. As a result, the country was not affected by conﬂicts
among Western nations until 1859, when it began free trade with
the United States, the Netherlands, Russia, Great Britain, andFrance, and as a result, it developed its own culture under a stablesociety. Therefore, Westerners who came to Japan around thestart of trade in 1859 were able to record the original landscapeof KANAGAWA, which had not yet been transformed, in the formof paintings, photographs, and other images, as well as a variety
of descriptions.
The exhibition, titled Eyes on KANAGAWA, is set in the mid-19th
century, when round-the-world travel became feasible and globalization entered a new phase. This exhibition introduces the originallandscape and people of KANAGAWA at that time, using paintings, photographs, travelogues, and notes of stays in Japan
recorded through the eyes of foreign visitors to Japan.
The landscape of KANAGAWA was unusual to Westerners who
visited Japan at the time, but what was it about it that interested
them, and how did they communicate it to other Westerners? Bycomparing the KANAGAWA of today with the KANAGAWA of the
19th century as represented in the exhibition, visitors are encouraged to look at the transformation from various angles.
August 2024
Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of Cultural History*Because this exhibition also covers the Edo period (1603-1867) before theestablishment of Kanagawa Prefecture, the term KANAGAWA will be used
to include the current Kanagawa Prefecture and its surrounding areas.

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[ I ] Encounters with other cultures
The encounter between Japan with Spain and Portugal, which

led the Age of Exploration that began in the 15th century and isregarded as the beginning of globalization, dates back to the16th century. Both countries were active in a combination of
trade and Christian missionary work, and tales of Japan werebrought to the West by missionaries. However, since their base ofoperations in Japan was located mainly in western Japan, from
Kyushu to Kyoto and Osaka, they could not accurately grasp
even the shape of the Japanese archipelago, since their observations were also centered in western Japan. Maps of the world
made in the West, for example, begin to depict Honshu in a small
area to the east as seen from Europe. A map of Japan was also
produced in the West, but since it was drawn directly from a mapof Japan published in Japan, it did not clearly show KANAGAWA.
It was not until the Edo period that descriptions of KANAGAWA
began to appear. During the period of Sakoku, the Dutch were
the only Western nation allowed to trade in Nagasaki, and the
shogunate allowed them to visit Edo periodically to express their
gratitude to the Tokugawa Shogun. The Dutch doctors accompanying the Dutch merchant general who participated in the
mission wrote accounts of their stay in Japan and compiled what
they saw and heard on their way to Edo (now Tokyo). They
published what might be called books on Japanese studies in
Europe, and thus conveying the situation from Kyoto and Osaka
to Edo to the West.
The image of Japan, dubbed the “Golden Land of Zipangu” byMarco Polo, became clearer than it had been in the 16th century,
when missionaries ﬁrst described the country.

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A. Trade and Missionary
As symbolized by Columbus' arrival in
the Americas in 1492 and Vasco da
Gama's discovery of the Indian route in
1498, Western nations expanded into
previously unknown continents andregions. This could be seen as the
beginning of globalization. Spain andPortugal, which were expanding theirinﬂuence at the time, began to visit
Asia in search of spices, and by themid-16th century they had reached the
Kyushu region of Japan and began
trading with Japan. The trade is called
the Nanban trade because Spain andPortugal were called “Nanban” (southern barbarians). Along with merchants
for the purpose of trade, Jesuit
missionaries, including Francis Xavier,also came to Japan and engaged in
active missionary activities.

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Nanban Folding Screens depict suchtrade and missionary activities by the
Nanbans. Currently, about 90 items havebeen identiﬁed. Most of them were
produced after 1587, when Toyotomi
Hideyoshi issued the Anti-Christian
Edicts. Because they remained inmerchant families that operated shipping
businesses in Sakai, Osaka, Tsuruga,
Kanazawa, Takaoka, Yamagata, etc., it isthought that the Nanban Folding Screensdepicting a black ship loaded withtreasures was considered a lucky charmto pray for prosperous business and safe
voyages, similar to the images of treasure
ships and the Seven Gods of Good Luck.
While Nanban Folding Screens depict
trade and missionary activities, they also
depict the interplay between the gaze ofthe people of a foreign country toward
Japan and the gaze of the people ofJapan toward a foreign country.

B. NIPPON as represented on a map
After the German theologian and geographer Münster produced a map
including Japan and the Americas in 1550 based on the Geography written byPtolemy of ancient Rome, it was in the Netherlands that cartography became
active thereafter. Mercator, a representative of the Flemish school, whichreached its peak of cartography in Europe from the mid-16th to the 17th
century, developed his own method of mapmaking, and his friend Ortelius
published Theatre of the World, which was well received.
After the mid-17th century, France, the country of Guillaume de L'Isle,
became the center of cartography, followed by Great Britain in the 19th
century. This transition was truly a nation of world hegemony, and with therise of trade came a rise in cartography.
Many world maps produced in the West uniformly placed themselves on theleft edge of the screen (west), and the East Asian region, including Japan,
was drawn on the right across the Eurasian continent. However, the information on Japan was inaccurate because it was based on maps produced by theJesuit missionary Coronelli and brought by the Dutch East India Company.

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C. Information on Japan for Dutch merchants
In the mid-17th century, when the so-called Sakoku began, the Dutch East India Company, the only Western country allowed to trade with Japan, established a trading post
ﬁrst in Hirado and then in Dejima in Nagasaki from 1841. The chief of the trading post
and other members of the trading post, who resided there, took the opportunity of
their visit to Edo, which was the only opportunity where they could see places outside
Nagasaki, to record the manners and customs of the people of the time, and after
returning home, they compiled the information into a book, which helped to spread theimage of Japan in the West.
Engelbert Kämpfer, who lived in Dejima as a doctor attached to the trading post for
about two years from 1690, visited Edo twice, in 1691 and 1692, and was received by
the ﬁfth shogun, Tsunayoshi. After returning home, he summarized his ﬁndings in
Amoenitates Exoticae and The History of Japan. Bijdrage Tot De Kennis Van Het Japansche
Rijk was written by Fisscher, who lived in Dejima for nine years from 1820, and contains
similar descriptions to those in Siebold's Nippon. At the end of the Edo period, it wastranslated by Western scholars such as Seikei Sugita and Gempo Mitsukuri, and circulated in Japan.

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[ Ⅱ ] The opening of the country as depicted
The ﬁrst time KANAGAWA was painted in earnest by Westerners was
in 1853 by Wilhelm Heine and Eliphalet Brown Jr. who accompanied
Commodore Perry's Japanese expedition to Japan for the purpose of
concluding a trade treaty. Many of the images were included as
illustrations in the expedition's ofﬁcial report, Narrative of the Expedition of an American Squadron to the China Seas and Japan (hereinafter
Narrative). Scenes of historical moments, such as the ﬁrst landing at
Kurihama and Yokohama, were produced separately as elephantlithographs. These images were later compiled by others who cameto Japan and reused as illustrations for their own accounts of theirstay in Japan and travelogues. The image of KANAGAWA in the Westwas to be spread in a stereotypical manner.
In order to show that it is possible to view materials from a variety ofperspectives, this exhibition attempts to explain one or a group ofmaterials from the viewpoints of multiple researchers. Visitors areinvited to look at the materials from their own unique perspective andtell their own stories.

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D. Illustrations of the Expedition in JapanThe activities of the Japanese expedition led by Perry, sent by the U.S. government toconclude a trade treaty with Japan, were sketched or photographed by Heine, Brown
Jr. and others, many of which were included as illustrations in the Narrative, while six
major scenes of the activities were produced separately as elephant lithographs. The
book contains six lithographs and an explanatory sheet with the titles of thelithographs, and is housed in a fold-out cover.
Each lithograph bears a title describing the scene, with a written inscription below it,
To Commodore M. C. Perry, Ofﬁcers & men of the Japan Expedition, this Print isrespectfully dedicated by their Obt. Servt. Heine & Brown, a dedication by the creators
Heine and Brown, Jr. to Perry and others who participated in the Japanese expedition.
In viewing the Illustrations of the Expedition in Japan, visitors are invited to draw attention to the illustrations included in the Narrative. The ﬁgures depicted in the illustrations
were made into a collage and also appeared in the Illustrations of the Expedition in
Japan. Try and ﬁnd out where they are.

E. Narrative
Ofﬁcial report of the Japanese expedition led by Commo-

dore Perry. It was printed in 1856 and submitted to the U.S.
Senate and House of Representatives. Along with records ofthe expedition's activities after Perry's departure from

Norfolk on the east coast of the U.S., the book also includes
information on the customs and manners of the regions

visited before his arrival in Japan. Appendixes include
articles, illustrations, and various reports on natural history,observations on astronomy, and reports on the expedition's

waterways, and can be read as an account of the expedition.

The book was compiled by Francis Hawkes, who was not amember of the expedition, and is based on the diaries andother records of Perry and other members of the expedition.
As the book title suggests, it can be viewed as a “narrative”
by Hawks. In addition to the descriptions, lithographs andwoodcuts by Heine, Brown Jr. and others are included as
illustrations, which serve as documentary images andconvey the situation of the time.

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F. Imagined Kurihama landing
Many lithographs were produced by actual-ly seeing or photographing the sites, as

Heine and Brown did, and circulated in theWest as true accounts. On the other hand,
however, the images are created based on

the written records of others and combinedwith the images they had before, eventhough they have not actually seen them,and are disseminated as if they were facts.

This resource is a general education bookthat summarizes and compiles 29 of themostfamoustravelandexplorationaccounts of the 19th century, including the
Narrative and the Narrative of My Captivity

in Japan by Golovnin, a Russian soldier who
was captured and imprisoned in 1811.

Although titled “The Landing of the American Expedition in Japan”, the buildings andpeople depicted do not look like those inJapan. The creator of this painting did not

see the scene, but embedded the landing of
the American expeditionary force into his
own image of Asia in general.

[Ⅲ]

KANAGAWA and Japan as seen by globetrotters

In 1859, the Sakoku system was broken by the trade treaties signed the previous yearwith the United States, the Netherlands, Russia, Great Britain, and France. As one of
the ﬁve trading ports, the present Port of Yokohama was opened as a port in Kanagawa, a post town at that time, close to Edo (Tokyo). As a result, many travelers from
Europe and the United States, known as globetrotters, began to visit Japan for the
purpose of traveling around the world, along with merchants. With the constructionof transcontinental railroads in Canada and the United States and the launch of large
intercontinental steam liners, round-the-world travel was no longer a dream. Today
they still visit various parts of Kanagawa, a popular tourist destination, and travel toother cities in Japan. They are also keenly interested in and purchase photo albums
with lacquer-decorated covers, ceramics, and other handicrafts. Although the
production itself is done by Japanese, the locations and designs depicted and photographed, such as Kamakura, Enoshima, and Hakone, reﬂect the tastes of foreigners.
These are created with the foreigner's “eye” in mind. Photo albums and ceramics were
widely distributed throughout the world as symbols of KANAGAWA, so to speak.
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G. Descriptive Map Shewing the Treaty Limits
Round Yokohama Including the Province of Sagami& Portions of Kai Idzu, Musashi and Suraga

According to treaties concluded by the Shogunate with Western nations beginningin 1859, a “promenade zone” was established in which Westerners could movefreely within a 10-ri (about 40 km) radius from the port opening in principle. Since
the Edo area would be included within 10 ri, the Rokugo River (Tama River) was
excluded to the east, and the tip of the Miura Peninsula was excluded to the south
due to defense issues. The boundary is marked by a pink line. It was later editedby A. G. S. Hawes, Royal Marines, who, with Ernest Satow, an interpreter attachedto the British legation, wrote A Handbook for Travellers in Central & Northern Japan,
showing the actual itinerary of the group that traveled from Yokohama between
1865 and 1867. In addition, the Enoshima and Kamakura area is marked with ★,indicating that it has a spectacular view. Many visitors to Yokohama used thismap as a guide as they traveled around KANAGAWA, and many of the locations
photographed are the travel routes and scenic spots shown here.

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H. Gountei Sadahide
Ukiyo-e artist active from the end of the Edo period to the early Meiji
period. As a pupil of Toyokuni Utagawa III, he left behind many ukiyo-e
prints. After the opening of the port of Kanagawa (Yokohama) in 1859,
he produced many ukiyo-e with Yokohama as the subject. In addition,
he visited Yokohama to report on the port opening and wrote Yokohama Kaikou Kenbun-shi Yokohama Port Observatory Journal, a book ofreportage that includes his own drawings. Let us pay attention to thegaze of the Japanese people toward Westerners, who are the object ofWesterners' gaze.

I. Kanagawa Diary
This is a later compilation of the diary written by Bunshi Sato, a doctorfrom Kubo-mura, Tsuzuki-gun, Musashi Province, over a 12-year period
from 1849 to 1860, when he moved to the Kanagawa-juku. It has two
characteristics. The ﬁrst is that it began as a diary, but from the middle
it took on the character of a hearsay, and the second is that it gathersa variety of information based on Bunshi's extensive circle of friends.
When the port of Kanagawa (Yokohama) was opened and foreigners
began to reside in the area, their activities began to be described indiaries. The book clearly describes the movements of Consul General
Townsend Harris, who made Hongakuji Temple in Aokibashi, Yokohama, the U.S. Consulate General, and the damage caused by the expulsion of foreigners.

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J. Rutherford Alcock
Born in London in 1809, Alcock ﬁrst became a surgeon but gave up his
career as a doctor after suffering from rheumatism. He later joined theForeign Ofﬁce, where he served as consul in Shanghai, Canton, and othermajor ports in China. In 1859, when the port of Kanagawa (Yokohama)
was opened, he became the ﬁrst British Consul General in Japan. While
many Westerners at the time viewed themselves as civilized and the
Asian region as barbaric, Alcock was an early observer of Japanese
civilization. He traveled with Charles Wagman, a painter who was acorrespondent for the Illustrated London News, a weekly illustrated newspaper in Great Britain, and climbed Mt. Fuji.

K. Aime Humbert
Born in Switzerland in 1819, he served as president of the Swiss Watchmakersʼ Union and as a member of parliament, and came to Japan as
minister extraordinary and plenipotentiary. In 1864, he signed theJapan-Switzerland Treaty of Amity and Trade. During the 10 months of
his stay, he collected photographs, paintings, and woodblock prints by
Felice Beato and others. The illustrations in Le Japon Illustre reuse thesealready created images of Japan.
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L. Louise M. Williams
In August 1897, an American
woman, Louise M. Williams,
arrived in Yokohama on a large
cruise ship operated by the
Canadian Paciﬁc Railway from
Vancouver, Canada, at a time
when Japan was still recoveringfrom the Sanriku Earthquake ofthe previous year. She was one of
the globetrotters, which were
popular among the wealthyclass at that time, and stayed inJapan for about six months on
her round-the-world-trip.
She ﬁrst stayed at Yokohama Grand Hotel. After receiving a “Foreigner's Interior Travel
Permit” from Kanagawa Prefecture, she traveled with a Japanese interpreter and guide to
Nikko, Hakone, Tokyo, Ise, Kyoto, Kobe, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and other places beyond thepermitted travel zone, purchasing ceramics, photo albums with Shibayama lacquerware
covers, and other artifacts. She carefully kept cards of stores she visited during her stay, as
well as receipts for the purchase of photo albums, swords and other items. In Yokohama,
she visited art dealers such as Numajima Shop and Matsuishiya. In Williams' eyes, Yokohama must have seemed like a city overﬂowing with arts and crafts.

M. Mrs. Rea

Travelogue of a British woman, A.M. Rea. It is a compilation ofher observations from her round-the-world trip between 1891
and 1892 after her return home. She visited Japan in December
and described her observations during her trip, including
sketches she drew, photographs she purchased, and a drawing
of a woman with a baby on her back sketched by Yokohama-based artist Charles Wirgman. She also casts her gaze on
the common people who are the everyday people of Japan.
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N. Famous places
Westerners who came to Japan after the opening of the port of Kanagawa (Yokohama), both those working as merchants and those who came for sightseeing, visitedmany places of interest. However, the places they visited were not new tourist attractions for foreigners. As shown in the “Descriptive Map Shewing the Treaty Limits RoundYokohama Including the Province of Sagami & Portions of Kai Idzu, Musashi andSuraga,” Enoshima, Oyama, Kamakura, and Hakone had already been visited byforeigners as places of worship or for sightseeing since the Edo period. It has always
been a place for people to heal, both in the past and in the present.

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O. Yokohama photographs
The photographs of landscapes andthe manners and customs of Japanese people in Yokohama and otherparts of Japan, colored with watercolors, are called “Yokohama photographs” because the majority ofthem were produced in Yokohama.
Cherry blossoms in YokohamaʼsNoge, Enoshima, the Great Buddha
of Kamakura, Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine, Hakone, and otherplaces visited by foreigners at thattime were photographed in several
patterns. It is assumed that many
foreigners bought the products.
The Yokohama area was ﬁrst photographed by the British photographer Felice Beato. Whenthe Beato Photo Studio went out of business in 1877, his assistant, Kinbei Kusakabe, took it
over and produced the ﬁrst album with mother-of-pearl inlay. Around 1890, the KIMBEI
trade name became known in Europe and the United States, and was exhibited at the 1904
St. Louis World's Fair. The Italian photographer Farsari, who had formed a partnership withJapanese photographer Kozaburo Tamamura in 1885, had also entered the ﬁeld ofcommercial photography by purchasing the Stillfried & Andersen Studio in Yokohama.
In the albums they produced and sold, they captured scenes and customs that were ordinary
to Japanese people, but which, in the eyes of foreigners, were extraordinary and interesting.

P. Yokohama ware
In Yokohama, the production of export
ceramics ﬂourished. In order to efﬁciently
produce export items, a production
method was adopted in which white basematerial was purchased from Seto, Arita,
and other ceramic centers, painted tosuit foreign tastes, and ﬁred insmall-scale kilns for ﬁnishing. These
ceramics were known as Yokohama-ezuke (Yokohama painted ceramics).
On the other hand, the Makuzu pottery
founded by Miyagawa Kozan handled allprocesses from shaping the base to ﬁring.
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©Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of Cultural Histotory 2024