Focus on
BRILLIANTLY red like a Far Eastern sunrise, the symbolic circle on the announcement of Dartmouth's program on "Classical and Contemporary Japan" broke through the January overcast and week by week the program it heralded has grown in intensity. With the advent of spring the program's planners look for campuswide illumination.
Like its predecessors dealing with "Religion and the Contemporary Arts" and "The World of William Shakespeare," the six-month program on Japan is designed to relate the work within the academic departments with the creative and performing arts at the Hopkins Center by concentrating on a particular topic. Unlike the programs in 1963 and 1964, this year's undertaking is interwoven with the objectives of the faculty-oriented Comparative Studies Center.
"Classical and Contemporary Japan" has four components: the faculty seminar on modern Japan under the auspices of the Comparative Studies Center; five courses for undergraduates dealing with Japanese history and religion; the Hopkins Center presentations of Japanese theatre, fine arts, films, music, and crafts; and a potpourri of other campus events ranging from a session on science and technology in Japan to aikido exhibitions. Aikido is an ancient art of self defense similar to karate.
The chief coordinators for their respective organizations in this integrated program - Warner Bentley, Director of the Hopkins Center, and Professors Laurence I. Radway and Francis W. Gramlich, Co-Directors of the Comparative Studies Center - were fortunate in having the services of a specialist on Japan, Visiting Professor Lawrence A. Olson Jr., to advise and plan events and to aid in choosing Japanese who are leaders in their fields, as well as American scholars on Japan, to participate in the program through campus visits.
Professor Olson first became interested in Japan during Naval service in World War II when he learned the language and served three years as a translator. After the war he held several governmental posts in the Far East, including that of cultural attache at the American Embassy in the Philippines. He returned to Harvard to earn his Ph.D. in Asian history and languages and subsequently joined the American Universities Field Service reporting on developments and writing about Japan and Japan's relationships with other Asian nations.
Although unheralded as such, the Hopkins Center's program on Japan really began in the fall term with a series of Japanese films and a lecture and demonstration of Noh theatre by Sadayo Kita and Akoyo Tomoeda of Tokyo. The beginning of winter-term classes in January saw the opening of the Grilli Collection of Oriental Art with works dating from the 3rd to the 20th Century. The owner, Professor Elise Grilli of Tokyo's Sophia College, was on campus for a gallery talk on her collection, an address on modern Japanese painting open to the public, several lectures to an undergraduate course, and participation in the Comparative Studies Seminar. Professor Grilli's busy schedule provided an early example of how the program's components are interwoven.
In addition to the Grilli Exhibition, Hopkins Center hung . displays during January of modern Japanese calligraphy and Japanese historical photographs. In February Hopkins Center featured the Roland A. Gibson '24 Collection of Japanese Abstract Art, some 40 works by contemporary Japanese painters and print- makers which Professor Gibson, Chairman of the Department of Economics at Washington College, Maryland, sought out and purchased in 1963. Described as "what may well be the most representative collection of Japanese abstract art in America," the Gibson Collection reveals the present-day search for a native expression by postwar artists who look to Japan's past as well as to the modern Western world for inspiration and techniques. Professor Gibson also came to Hanover to give a gallery talk. At the same time in the neighboring Barrows Print room the Center offered an exhibition of prints by the Japanese artist Sharaku, an 18th Century dancer and portrayer of Tokyo actors and wrestlers.
Forthcoming exhibits in the Hopkins Center include "Vernacular Classics of Japan" from the Museum of Modern Art, "Industrial Design in Japan" from Industrial Design magazine, "Japanese Photographs by Werner Bischof," "Paintings and Pastels by Japanese Children," and "Japanese Ceramics" from the Japan Society. In addition there will be an exhibition and lecture, by Shiko Munakata, a Japanese print-maker who has gained world renown. The noted Japanese ceramist Yu Fujiwara will serve as visiting artist for the spring term, arriving this month, and will work with students and others interested in pottery making. During May, a Japanese garden designed by Kaneji Domoto, a Japanese landscape architect, will be displayed in the Hopkins Center sculpture court.
The dramatic highlight of the Hopkins Center program on Japan will be the presentation of a contemporary Japanese play to be directed by Takeo Matsuura. Matsuura, whose abilities in the production of both modern and traditional Japanese drama are recognized far beyond Tokyo, is on campus for several months. Professor Donald Keene of the Department of Chinese and Japanese at Columbia University will arrive in mid-April for a pre-production lecture on Japanese theatre. Professor Keene will also participate in a Comparative Studies seminar session.
Japanese music will also get its share of attention in the Hopkins Center. Early in April a concert will be presented by Kimio Eto, a koto player, and Suzushi Hanayagi, a dancer. Later in the month pianist Selma Epstein will perform in a concert of contemporary Japanese music, and Prof. William P. Malm of the University of Michigan will give two lectures on Japanese classical and contemporary music.
The courses offered to undergraduates dealing with Japanese history and religion during both winter and spring terms include Professor Olson's "Topics in Modern Japanese History," "Japanese Civilization after the Restoration" by Prof. Donald Bartlett '24, "History of the Far East to the 19th Century" by Prof. Ernest P. Young, and "Asian Religions" by Prof. Wing-tsit Chan.
Professor Olson is director of the Comparative Studies Center's seminar on modern Japan. Taking part in this study of Japan's emergence as a modern society since the middle of the 19th Century as "participants" are Assistant Professors of History Young and Robert G. Landen, Professor of Economics Lawrence G. Hines, Associate Professor of Geography Robert E. Huke '4B, Professor of Speech Almon B. Ives, Professor of English Henry B. Williams; as "auditors," Instructor in Government Thomas W. Robinson and Harold N. Moorman, Assistant Director of the Office of Student Counseling; and as "consultants," Professors Bartlett and Chan.
In addition to Professors Grilli and Keene, scholars coming to Hanover to address the seminar include Prof. Martin Bronfenbrenner of Carnegie Tech, "Industrialization, 1868-1920"; Prof. Robert A. Scalapino of the University of California at Berkeley, "Meiji Political and Social Thought" (also a guest lecturer for the Great Issues course); Prof. Herbert Passin of Columbia, "Japanese Intellectuals and Mass Culture"; Dr. Robert Jay Lifton of Yale, "Japanese Youth in Protest"; Dr. James C. Abegglen of McKinsey and Co., New York, "Sociology of the Japanese Elite: Who holds power, how decisions are made, how society operates at the top"; and Dr. Douglas Overton of the Japan Society, New York, "Japan and the United States."
Many other sessions for the seminar will be organized and presented by the faculty participants themselves on topics dealing with pre-war areas such as "Japanese Totalitarianism and Imperialism" and "Literature of the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries" and post-war areas such as "The American Occupation of Japan," "Postwar Economic Recovery," and "Japan's Role in Asia." The purpose of such intensive study by the faculty members involved is to help them in seeking out and preparing materials on classical and contemporary Japan that the professor could introduce or integrate into courses he teaches.
In addition to the activities at the two Centers many other events related to the over-all program are scheduled by campus groups. The annual Ziskind Lecture Series, for instance, will feature Prof. Robert N. Bellah of Harvard, a leading scholar in Japanese religious studies, who will give three lectures on the central topic, "The Crisis in Meaning: Japan, Asia, and the West." The Dartmouth Scientific Association will sponsor a colloquium on "Science and Technology in Japanese Development." Baker Library and the College Museum will put up special exhibits, the latter's being a display of lovely Japanese textile dyeing stencils.
Other related plans focusing campus attention on Japanese customs and activities include aikido exhibitions by visiting specialists from Japan, kite flying in the Japanese tradition on a suitably windy day in May, a number of books about Japan or written by Japanese authors that can be read to satisfy the General Reading Program requirements, Cutter Hall and Dartmouth Christian Union discussions on social and political problems in Japan, and special presentations for the Hanover community by WDCR and The Dartmouth.
The preparation of a program of this scope was not without its special problems-one being to determine where in the United States one could buy the special clay needed by the pottery-making artist-in-residence (the answer is Ohio). The program also had some very special and enthusiastic "assisters"- President Dickey himself while in Japan a year ago made the College's first personal contact with theatre director Matsuura and with Professor Olson too. Sidney B. Cardozo Jr. '38 helped negotiate to get the potter Fujiwara to Dartmouth, and another alumnus, D. Herbert Beskind '36, was instrumental in helping to arrange for the Japanese garden. Many others in the United States and Japan, including Dr. Overton who made a number of trips to Hanover to offer his advice, and the Japanese Embassy, contributed to the total program.
The noted Oriental Art Collection of Elise Grilli of Sophia College, Tokyo, was a program highlight in January
The Grilli exhibition was followed by the Roland Gibson '24 Collection of Japanese Abstract Art, now showing.
Among those playing a leading role in Dartmouth's current program on "Classicaland Contemporary Japan" are (l to r) Prof. Francis W. Gramlich and Prof. LaurenceI. Radway, co-directors of the Comparative Studies Center, and Visiting ProfessorLawrence A. Olson, a specialist on Japan, who is directing a faculty seminar onmodern Japan and also teaching an undergraduate course.
FULL-COLOR PRINTS created by Toshusai Sharaku in 1794-95 for Kabuki theater performances were shown, in striking woodblock reproductions, in the Barrows Print Room of Hop- kins Center during February. These four prints from the collection on loan from the Japan Society of New York are
representative of Sharaku's colorful depiction of actors and actresses. The top prints were done for "Tales of Revenge" and the lower two for "The Loved Wife's Parti-Colored Bridle." Among the 160 Sharaku prints in existence are some depicting wrestlers.
FULL-COLOR PRINTS created by Toshusai Sharaku in 1794-95 for Kabuki theater performances were shown, in striking woodblock reproductions, in the Barrows Print Room of Hop- kins Center during February. These four prints from the collection on loan from the Japan Society of New York are
representative of Sharaku's colorful depiction of actors and actresses. The top prints were done for "Tales of Revenge" and the lower two for "The Loved Wife's Parti-Colored Bridle." Among the 160 Sharaku prints in existence are some depicting wrestlers.
FULL-COLOR PRINTS created by Toshusai Sharaku in 1794-95 for Kabuki theater performances were shown, in striking woodblock reproductions, in the Barrows Print Room of Hop- kins Center during February. These four prints from the collection on loan from the Japan Society of New York are
representative of Sharaku's colorful depiction of actors and actresses. The top prints were done for "Tales of Revenge" and the lower two for "The Loved Wife's Parti-Colored Bridle." Among the 160 Sharaku prints in existence are some depicting wrestlers.
FULL-COLOR PRINTS created by Toshusai Sharaku in 1794-95 for Kabuki theater performances were shown, in striking woodblock reproductions, in the Barrows Print Room of Hop- kins Center during February. These four prints from the collection on loan from the Japan Society of New York are
representative of Sharaku's colorful depiction of actors and actresses. The top prints were done for "Tales of Revenge" and the lower two for "The Loved Wife's Parti-Colored Bridle." Among the 160 Sharaku prints in existence are some depicting wrestlers.
