The Washington herald., 1921-05-08
Art and Friendship.

JaPahebe piOBIdul Sdubeb SOhSeih "
our citizens and the American naval program is
source Of dsquiet to the Mikados subjectI Yap.
the Langdon incident at Vladivostok, California
land laws and other matters cast dark shadows
across the fabric OF friendship which q certain
state Of alliance during the world war seemed to
guarantee would be woven more strongly than was
possible before.
In light of the disturbing international atmos-
phere, It is particularly pleasing at this time to
receive from Japan a testimonial to the cosmopoli-
tanism of art in the form Of book gotten up as
only the Npponese craftsmen do it. II is
properly not book at all but collection OF re-
productions of the artist Hroshge's works with a
foreword by the critic Yone Noguchi. the whole
bound fascinatngly with eream-colored plate paper
and sewed with silk
Holding this beautiful book in ones hand one
is forcbly reminded Of the absolute divorce existing
between Japan, the empire, and Japan, the land OF
coorful art. On the hand the gods OF arms
and plate the practice of elusive diplomacy,
territorial absorption. Nietzscheansm and stern
dedication to national ambitions even il they entail
death; on the other the love of nature, gentle
contemplation of simple beauty, charming frank
ness in its define ation dedication to the rigorous
demands of minute and perfect work in ivory,
bronze and wood. A people capable of astounding
achievements in warfare and almost feminine gen
teness in the arts.
How much better il it were not nearly always
the fash of the drawn blade that Americans think
they behold when they look towards Japan. How
welcome is Noguchi's "Hiroshge" and how much
more worthy side of the Japanese character does
it display than that Junkertum Which possesses
hotheads Of the Mikado's Diet whose speeches re-
vertebrate through the press of the civilized world
Certainly if Japan wishes to camouhage her aims in
the Pacific and elsewhere she could better do it by
heavier exports of her unsurpassed craft fabrica-
tons than by declarations of amity and yelling OF
her Chinese and Siberian programs.
1t is the biblophic instinct that is first ap-
pealed to by this slim volume of Noguch and Hi
roshige. 1t is incased in a ceverly designed folder
of boards covered with cloth Of blue-the utrama-
rine that the great Japanese artist so frequently
employed. Each page of the rice paper, which
takes print with the greatest obtainable elearness'
is double There is a colored frontspece, repro
ducton of one of Hroshige's best known works,
Evening Rain at Karasaki," two-page center
piece of the sacred mountain Fuji-Yama, and
score of prints done by the colotype process
which makes for fathfulness OF detail without sac
rifcing the appearance of softness
As to the literary quality of Noguchis sketch
of Hiroshige and his criticisms of the artists
works, it is delightfully."- in keeping with the gen
eral makeup 1t is in the language OF the Japan
ese who has learned English and learned 1t well,
but still thinks in the Japanese idiom. lhere Is
an elegance Of phrase and still there Is an exotic
quality to many of the constructions. 1t might be
dspleasins to the purst but it is most engaging
to one seeking linguistic color effects Nogushi
evidently was confronted by the dilemma OF writ
ing in Japanese and risking the danger of loss OF
meaning in translation from the more difficult
tongue to the English, or in writing in tongue
not native and one with which he probably would
never become easy. He wisely chose the latter
course His phraseology is quaint, as witness the
following: ,
THE blue of the Japanese colour-prints up 10 the
time of Hokusai and Hiroshige is. unlike the west
.r hin. p;gment which is glad to mix with another
COLON, to make life active, thing highly homo
ucneous. therefore a colour as it was before 1t
knew any other colour to mix with Thus oap-
t;zed under the blue of the Sumda River in late
afternoon of one spring day, ceased at once to
be a Westerner and my mind entered slowly into