Living with Art22

Living with Art ―Spiritually Rich LifeMuseums providing easy access to art■ Major cultural events held during ﬁscal 2008

J. Front Retailing has museums in its major department stores

Aida Mitsuo (Matsuzakaya Museum and Daimaru Shinsaibashi)

and holds topical exhibitions to provide easier access toexcellent art works in Japan and abroad. We oﬀer spirituallyaﬄuent lifestyles to visitors through paintings and a wide variety

Kobori Enshu: Encounter with Beauty (Matsuzakaya Museum and Daimaru Kobe)
Twentieth Century Masters: Eyes Looking at Beauty and Eyes Looking at Society(Daimaru Umeda and Tokyo)
Nakau Collection: Four Great Ukiyoe Masters (Daimaru Tokyo)
Koiso Ryohei and Higashiyama Kaii (Daimaru Kobe)of other fascinating works of art including photos, deigns andOriginal Illustrations by John Burningham (Daimaru Sapporo)

picture book illustrations to make a cultural contribution to local

Ancient Egypt (Matsuzakaya Museum and Daimaru Kobe)

communities.
Matsuzakaya has a full-scale museum named

MatsuzakayaMuseum in Nagoya store, which is unusual for department
stores. It is a modern museum complete with digniﬁed and calm
display space and the equipments to keep exhibits in goodcondition and protect them from crimes and disasters.

DaimaruMuseums are placed in Shinsaibashi, Umeda, Tokyo, Kyoto andKobe stores.
The exhibitions that Daimaru and Matsuzakaya held during

Nakamura Ikuo Photo Exhibition: The Sea and its Creatures（Daimaru Umeda and Sapporo）
Rouault and Matisse (Matsuzakaya Museum)
Camille Pissarro (Daimaru Tokyo)
Hokusai Painting Mt.Fuji (Matsuzakaya Museum)The 93rd Inten: Exhibition of the Japan Art Institute (Daimaru Shinsaibashi)
Shirasu Jiro and Masako (Daimaru Kobe and Sapporo)
Great Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Matsuzakaya Museum)■ Exhibition schedule for ﬁscal 2009

ﬁscal 2008 are listed on the right. (Daimaru Sapporo store gives
exhibitions in the hall on the 7th ﬂoor.)

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1. Léonard Fujita Portrait in 1927
2. Four Great Dinner Sets of Ekaterina II
From the Collection of the State Hermitage Museum

4(From left) Creamer, sugar bowl and saucer, coffee pot
and coffee cup and saucer

from the Cameo ServiceSèvres Royal Porcelain Factory, France (1778-79)
CTexts, photos, The State Hermitage Museum, St.Petersburg, 2009

3 3. Italian Art and Napoleon

Madonna and Child with an Angel by Sandro Botticelli (1467-70)

Photo:Jean-François Paccosi

4. The History and Various Treasures of Higashi Honganji
One part of the Annyo Rokushu Zu (Six Types of Birds in the Pure Land)
from the sliding-door panel paintings in the Goeido(Founder s Hall) by Mochizuki Gyokusen

Léonard Fujita（Matsuzakaya Museum and Daimaru Kobe）
Four Great Dinner Sets of Ekaterina II from the Collection of the State
Hermitage Museum（Daimaru Shinsaibashi）
Botticelli: Italian Art and Napoleon-Collection of Fesch Museum in Corsica（Daimaru Tokyo）
Hashimoto Kansetsu（Daimaru Kyoto）
Nakahara Junichi（Daimaru Kobe）
In Commemoration of the 750th Memorial for Shinran Shonin: The History andVarious Treasures of Higashi Honganji（Matsuzakaya Museum）
The 94th Inten: Exhibition of the Japan Art Institute（Daimaru Shinsaibashi）
The Legacy of Carthage（Daimaru Tokyo）※Details of the exhibitions to be held in ﬁscal 2009, including titles, are subject to changes.

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The world of Art Deco createdby architect W. M. Vories

It was in 1914 that Daimaru kimono fabric store, which was founded in 1717,

department store with seven stories above ground came into existence.

opened a Western style store with display windows in the present

The middle layer of the building is covered with grave scratched tiles. It is

Shinsaibashi. A few years later, in October 1918, a unique Gothic style

between the granite exterior wall of the ﬁrst ﬂoor and the outer wall of the top

four-story timber-frame and brick department store was born, which was rare

ﬂoor elaborately designed with terra cotta. Once you step into the store

even in Osaka. It was the ﬁrst building that W. M. Vories (1880-1964)

through the entrance with a relief of a peacock, which is a symbol of Daimaru,

designed for Daimaru. Regrettably, however, it was burned down only one

you will ﬁnd gorgeous details one after another, including fresco paintings onyear and four months later. The current building of Shinsaibashi store wasthe ceiling and a stained glass clock on the upper wall of the central elevator

constructed in four phases according to a plan. In the ﬁrst phase ofhall. All of them, including geometric patterns, abstract ﬂowers and trees, andconstruction, the southern half facing the arcade street of Shinsaibashisuji wassnow and mineral crystals, form the world of Art Deco uniﬁed in one tone.

completed in 1922, and in the second phase, the northern part facing theDepartment stores should have diﬀerent characteristics from region tosame street was completed in 1925. And then the third and fourth phases ofregion. Here is one of the approaches of Shinsaibashi store to oﬀer customers

additional construction of the part facing Midosuji street were completed in

special time and space as well as products and services.

1932 and the following 1933 respectively. This is how a Neo-Gothic style

Peacock relief

Mezzanine of the main building

Decoration of elevator hall

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Elevators on the 2nd floor of the main building

East side of the central staircase of the main building

Fresco ceiling

Stained glass designed after Aesop s Fables

Ceiling of light and colors

Relief ceiling

Elevator hall on the 1st floor of the main building

Stained glass clockKyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design Instituteand Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum

designs, Noh masks, byobu (folding screens) and armor and helmets werecollected. They were initially housed in a storehouse of Kyoto Merchandising
Branch, and in 1957, Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum was built with modern
equipment on the premises to keep them permanently as cultural assets. Now
it houses as many as 10,000 pieces of dyed textiles and related materials.

■ Roles of Kyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design InstituteKyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design Institute asks a group of the industry s
Kyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design Institute,machiya architecture of the Edo era

Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum
housing 10,000 pieces of dyed textiles

leading manufacturers to plan and produce original kimono fabric based on thedesigns developed through the study of the collection of Matsuzakaya Kimono
Museum and Matsuzakaya organizes the Exhibition of Kimono Masterpieces

Kyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design Institute was inaugurated in 1745 as Kyoto

every year to show and sell these works to customers. The ﬁrst exhibition wasMerchandising Branch of Matsuzakaya, a major kimono fabric dealer at theheld in Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka in fall 1935. During the war, Matsuzakaya

time, and had bought Kyoto kimono fabric for many years. Since Matsuzakaya

were forced to suspend it. However, after the war was over and the exhibition

Kimono Museum was opened in Kyoto Merchandising Branch in 1931 tomade a comeback in 1950, the company continues to organize it and held thecollect dyed textile works of art from all ages and countries, it has pursed the63rd exhibition in spring 2009. The institute is also committed to corporate

beauty of Japanese kimono and has researched and developed the design ofphilanthropy to inherit traditional culture of dyed textiles. In 1934, the institutetrendy kimono. In 1957, Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum was established as aasked Chiso Shoten (present Chiso), a kimono manufacturer in Kyoto, to restore

modern storage and treasures precious pieces of dyed textile art of national

the Keicho Kosode allegedly owned by Yodo-dono (concubine of Toyotomi

important cultural property class. （Kyoto Merchandising Branch was renamedHideyoshi) from the collection of Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum and it appeared

Kyoto Dyeing and Weaving Design Institute in 1990.）

in literature. When requested by domestic and overseas museums to allowthem to show some works from its collection in their special exhibitions of dyed

■ History of Kyoto Merchandising Branch

textiles and others, the museum lends them after due consideration. Recently,Matsuzakaya, which was founded as a kimono fabric dealer Ito Gofukuten in

an exhibition titled Kosode:

Nagoya in 1611, expanded the business to become a kimono fabric purveyor toHaute Couture Kimonos of thethe Owari Tokugawa clan around 1740 and advanced into Kyoto in 1745.

InEdo Period was held in Tokyo

order to further develop the business, Kyoto Merchandising Branch was(Suntory Museum of Art) andestablished as a store with buying functions in Kyoto, which was a production

Nagoya (Nagoya City Museum)

center of quality kimono fabric at the time. Originally, the branch was openedin 2008 and in Osaka (Osakain Muromachi Nishikikoji, and four years later, it was moved to the present

Municipal Museum of Art) inlocation in Shinmachidori Rokkaku-sagaru. Though it repeatedly suﬀered ﬁres2009 to show about 300 items,and incidents including Donguri Fire in 1788, Hamaguri Rebellion in 1864 andmainly including kosode of thethe Great Fire of Meiji in 1900, it was rebuilt each time and retains theEdo era, from the treasured

architecture of machiya (town house) of the Edo era.

collection of Matsuzakaya■ Establishment of Matsuzakaya Kimono Museum

Kimono Museum and received
extremely good reaction from

From the Taisho era to the Showa era, department stores were expected toabout 130,000 visitors in theproduce top quality kimono fabric using traditional dyeing skills, while they weretotal of these three locations.

transformed like department stores through popularization and the expansion ofWe will continue to assume aoﬀerings other than kimono fabric. With that historical backdrop, Matsuzakayarole in inheriting the precious

Kimono Museum was set up in Kyoto Merchandising Branch in 1931 andtraditional beauty of Japan bybegan to collect dyed textile works of art from the Nara era to the Edo era fromcreating opportunities to expose

Japan and other countries across the world to help create original kimono

many people to the essence offabric. The collection includes clothes such as kosode (small-sleeved kimono)Japanese dyed textile works ofof the Edo era, Noh costume, furisode (long-sleeved kimono), katabira (unlinedart unlike any other in the world.

Keicho Kosode allegedly worn by Yodo-donosummer kimono), jinbaori (battle surcoat) and obi (kimono belt) and kireji (cloth)of all countires such as Coptic cloth from Egypt, Incan cloth and Indian chintz.
In addition, a wide variety of arts and crafts including sample books of kosode

Furisode with design of fans on dark green crepe (Mid-Edo era)25