Japanese Architecture

The tokonoma or raised alcove is probably the best known form in Japanese architecture. There are many theories regarding its origin, but it is thought to have developed as a stationary wall area on which to attach the popular hanging-scroll paintings (kakemono) that were introduced from China . Prior to this development the walls were all composed of sliding doors, which were not suitable for hanging pictures. In the Momoyama period, pictures were often painted on the rear wall of the tokonoma.

Sukiya architecture displays a simplicity, a subtlety of taste, and a communion with nature that are typically Japanese. It is noteworthy that Hideyoshi, with his grandiose displays of lavishly decorated architecture, often retreated from castle to teahouse for the simplicity and charm that it offered. The flavor of sukiya architecture can be detected today in any home of merit. It is the essence of good Japanese architecture.

Japanese architecture is undoubtedly less well known and less appreciated than the architecture of any other civilized nation. Not only this, but it is almost universally misjudged, and while we have by degrees come to know and admire the pictorial and industrial arts of Japan, her architecture, which is the root and vehicle of all other modes of art, is passed over with a casual reference to its fantastic quality or a patronizing tribute to the excellence of some of its carved decoration.

Unjust and superficial as is this attitude it is perhaps excusable, for the Japanese architecture being logical, historical, ethnic, is, of course, profoundly Oriental, and it is as difficult for the Western mind to think in terms of the East, as it is for the same mind to understand or appreciate the vast and splendid fabrics of Oriental thought and Oriental civilization.

Carefully analyzed and faithfully studied, Japanese architecture is seen to be one of the great styles of the world. In no respect is it lacking in those qualities which have made Greek, Medieval, and Early Renaissance architecture immortal: as these differ among themselves, so does the architecture of Japan differ from them,. yet with them it remains logical, ethnic, perfect in development.

In one respect it is unique: it is a style developed from the exigencies of wooden construction, and here it stands alone as the most perfect mode in wood the world has known. As such it must be judged, and not from the narrow canons of the West that presuppose masonry as the only building material. Again, it is the architecture of Buddhism, and it must be read in the light of this mystic and wonderful system. Finally, it is the art of the Orient, taking form and nature from Eastern civilization, vitalized by the "Soul of the East," the artistic manifestation of the religion of meditation, of spiritual enlightenment, of release from illusion. It is separated from the art of the Western religion of action, of elaborate ethical systems, of practicality, by the diameter of being.

Bearing these things in mind, let us consider historically and critically the beginnings and subsequent development of Japanese architecture. The pagoda of Yakushiji marks the birth of national Japanese architecture; in it may be discovered the germs of its future development; loftiness and varied grace in place of the sombre severity of the Chinese model, daring originality, richness and elaboration of detail.

Before - this wonderful building was erected, Japanese architecture had passed through several stages; the first Korean impulse had worked itself out, and from the year 725 on to the beginning of the ninth century there was a steady retrogression both in sculpture and architecture.