Between 18-23 November 2019, the SACRIMA Team participated in the second installment of the DAAD-Waseda seminar at Waseda University, Tokyo. 

In this second installment of the joint research project, the SACRIMA team travelled to Japan to visit Buddhist and Shinto sites (Nara, Kyoto, Tokyo), and examine hidden Kirishitan community spaces and surviving artifacts from the era of seclusion (Osaka, Tokyo National Museum). The case of Fumi-e is a clear example of sacred images in contact and conflict, as bronze and brass reliefs of Christian imagery imported from Europe and later made by Japanese artisans in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. These sacred images became implements of persecution following the expulsion of foreigners from Japan under the isolationist policies of the Tokugawa shogunate: suspected Christians were required to step upon and desecrate Fumi-e to prove that they did not follow the Christian faith. These same images of lamentations, Crucifixions, and Madonna and Child representations, would have received devotional touch across Europe, acted as ex-votos to Christian shrines, as seen in the first seminar at the Bavarian Madonna cult site of Altötting. Such surviving hidden Christian imagery in Japan epitomizes the endurance of early modern sacred representations, as their perceived power and danger highlights the persistent belief in an image’s agency independent of active missionary intervention.

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PROGRAM

TOKYO GUEST LECTURE: 22 November Toyama Campus, building 33-3F, room 331, 16:30 – 18:30 

Chiara FRANCESCHINI, Professor, Institut für Kunstgeschichte. On the Normativity of Sacred Images in Europe and the Geography of Art

Akira AKIYAMA, Professor, Department of Art History, University of Tokyo. On Vestments for Statues, from Comparative Perspectives

Respondents: Yoshe Kojima, Clement Onn 

TOKYO WORKSHOP: 23 November Toyama Campus, building 36-6F, room 682, 13:00-13:10 

13:00-13:10 — Welcome: Yoshie Kojima 

MADONNAS/RELICS/CULTS — 13:10-13:50 

Chiara FRANCESCHINI, Professor, Institut für Kunstgeschichte, LMU. Local and Global Madonnas: ´la Madonna della Lettera´ and the question of the painted relic in Sicily, Malta and Rome 

Respondents: Yoshe Kojima, Mayumi Kuwabara 

PRINTS/COPIES — 13:50-14:30

Nelleke DE VRIES, PhD Student, Institut für Kunstgeschichte, LMU. Mobile Devotion: The Influence of Prints on Netherlandish Portable Altarpieces in the Sixteenth Century 

Respondents: Yoshie Kojima, Suijun Ra 

RELICS/COPIES/TECHNIQUES — 14:30-15:10

Erin GIFFIN, Research Associate, Institut für Kunstgeschichte, LMU. Relic and Replica: Constructions of the Santa Casa di Loreto in New Contexts

Respondents: Suijun Ra, Yoshie Kojima 

15:10-15:20 — Coffee Break 

ICONOGRAPHIES/PRINTS/SAINTS — 15:20-16:00

Cloe CAVERO DE CARONDELET, Research Associate, Institut für Kunstgeschichte, LMU. Crucified Children between Norwich and Nagasaki: Iconography and the Question of Scale

Respondents: Kikuro Miyashita  

TECHNIQUES/MATERIALS — 16:00-16:40

Clement ONN, Senior Curator, Asian Export Art, Asian Civilisations Museum. Visual Hybridity of Asian Christian Art

Respondents: Koji Kobayashi, Hiroaki Nabara 

SAINTS/ICONOGRAPHY — 16:40-17:10

Francesco MORES, Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter, Evangelisch-Theologische Fakultät, LMU/Adjunct Professor, History Department, Università degli Studi “La Statale”, Milan. Images and stories of Francis of Assisi

Respondents: Hisashi Yakou 

17:10-17:30 — Round Table: Waseda Team and LMU Team

Waseda Team in Tokyo: Yoshie Kojima, Mitsuteru Narayama, Suijun Ra, Mayumi Kuwabara, Hiroaki Nabara, Arika Morimoto

LMU Team in Tokyo: Chiara Franceschini, Cloe Cavero, Erin Giffin, Nelleke de Vries, Francesco Mores