Finding Design at the Pacific Asia Museum

The Pacific Asia museum doesn't have any artworks that are specifically designs, but two works I saw have a lot to do with design.

One is "Sleeping Woodcutter" by Hokusai, a famous Japanese artist who lived in the 18th century. The piece is a Sumi-e monochrome ink painting drawn with calligraphic lines. 

Hokusai, "Sleeping Woodcutter"

The piece is about different kinds of lines. The forms in the drawing are flat and simplified because the emphasis is on the brushstrokes and the different kinds of line that can can be produced through these brushstrokes. 

The piece also has rhythm and movement created through repetition of similar shapes and lines, as can be seen especially in the pile of cut wood in the painting. 

There is also no clear setting in the piece, so it looks like the figure is floating. This reminded me of something that the tour guide at the museum said about geishas. In many Japanese paintings, the pleasure district where geishas could be found is depicted as a floating world. This depiction comes from the fact that being in the pleasure district was seen as a fleeting moment transcending normal struggles in the physical world. 

With the tour guides words in mind, I think that Hokusai created a floating world by having no clear setting in his piece. I think he did this to comment on art and demonstrate that looking at art creates a feeling similar to that felt in the pleasure district. Looking at art is a fleeting transcendent moment outside of the drudgery of everyday life. 

Another piece I saw that I thought related to design was "Stone Garden in Kyoto" by another Japanese artist, Masayoshi Kasugai. This piece is comparatively much more recent. It is a paper collage created in 1952. The piece was made with hand-dyed mulberry fibers that were then attached to a folding screen. 

Kasugai, "Stone Garden in Kyoto" 

This piece depicts a stone garden. It therefore relates to design in the physical world. According to the tour guide at the museum, gardens in Japan are about unveiling. The viewer is supposed to be surprised at every turn. Gardens in Japan are also about economy. Nature in the garden is stripped down to its essential elements of land and water, with stones, such as those in this painting, representing land. The gardens are furthermore asymmetrical, as Kasugai's artwork is, in order to mimic nature.

Kasugai's work is a copy of a copy since it is mimicking a garden that is attempting to mimic nature. In order to mimic nature, the piece is simple-toned. Exercising economy in his color choices, Kasugai uses a gradation of similar colors and strategically places these colors in order to create what feels like a completed composition.