Tag: history

Eggplant week

Let’s reiterate a vegetable week! I could have chosen grean beans, but I realize I’ve already posted many recipes involving green beans, so I’ve opted for one other summer star: the eggplant. Funilly eggplants are as much used in Japanese cuisine than in Provence cuisine, though in Japan the eggplant species are slightly different, smaller or thin and long. 

They are also used in summer together with cucumber to make horses and oxes than the spirit of dead people ride to come back to the human world during the Obon period, which is either July 15th or August 15th depending whether one follows the new solar calendar or the old lunar calendar.

So, this week let’s celebrate eggplants!

Showa style

A scene from Tokyo twilight
A scene from Tokyo twilight

Yesterday was Showa day. Showa was the governing emperor from 1926 to 1989. Of course it covers WWII events, but what is really interesting for me is the postwar development of culture and style during and after the American occupation, after Japan’s been defeated. This period has been marked by a lot of movies, a radical modern style, the development of large housing complexes in the suburbs: danchi. This is very well depicted in a few movies I love: elegant beast (1962) by Yuzo Kawashima, Tokyo drifter (1966) by Seijun Suzuki, Good morning (1959) and Tokyo twilight by Yasujiro Ozu. It is also permisible from the works of Kenzaburo Oe. For a real taste of it, it is possible to visit a reconstructed danchi unit in Matsudo museum in Chiba prefecture and a few of this kind of units are still standing. After a trend for demolishig them (the beautiful Asagaya housing complex…) there is a trend now to refurbish these units  and use them as community housing where young people and old people would share space and benefit from the proximity of each other, hipster housing…

Asagaya housing complex in 2011 when we visited it, before it was demolished
Asagaya housing complex in 2011 when we visited it, before it was demolished

And just yesterday I found this amazing photo book that covers a lot of Showa style. The pictures are really nice and gives a good idea about what it was. More than just covering architecture it really covers style and a bit of fashion and habits.

Taisho style

At first when we came to Japan I couldn’t get used to these Japanese-Western (wa-yo) style things: buildings, clothes, food… Everything looked like a pale copy of something we have in Europe or there is in the US, but with something wrong. The most significant period of that style is probably the Taisho era (around 1910-1925), after the many trials in the Meiji period, when the style started to be more stable and much established.

It took me some time to really understand this style. Now I think this is my favorite period for Japanese art, architecture, design and clothing and even literature. Strangely, probably one of my favorite period in Western style too!
In terms of food my favorite is probably om-rice (オムライス), even it started in late Meiji. I’ll give you my recipe very soon!
There are fewer and fewer examples of Taisho architecture in Tokyo now because of a total lack of consciousness of these jewels (or maybe trying to ignore them for profits) and they are replaced one by one by ugly plastic prehab houses. But in areas such as Taito-ku north of Ueno, Ya-Ne-Sen between Taito-ku and Bunkyo-ku, or in Arakawa-ku around Senju and Kita-Senju it is still possible to see some along with some early Showa buildings. 
Ukiyoe by Yumeji Takehisa
present of the shamisen group
Dentist office in Ueno established in 1900,
and re- built in Showa 3/1928

An other excellent example is the Yasuda mansion near Sendagi (unfortunately rarely open to public) where it is possible to also enjoy interior design and original furnitures. More accessible yet less typical is the Asakura Chosho museum in Yanaka. Other options for a condensed viewing are open air museums where such houses have been moved to. There are two excellent places, the first is Meiji Mura near Nagoya in Inuyama, the other is the Tokyo Oedo Museum of Architecture in Koganei. It has a few exemplars that have been moved there for preservation.


Probably I came to understand and like this period through literature. It is widely covered in the work by Yukio Mishima and by Junichiro Tanizaki, where the mo-ga (modern girl) is well represented and that I massively read after starting to live in Tokyo. Probably “Naomi” is an excellent start. 
The music that I’ve had the chance to be introduce to by my husband shamisen group of ha-uta has also given an interesting insight about customs and women liberalization at that time.

Regarding graphic arts, I really like ukiyoe from Yumeji Takehisa and Goyo Hashiguchi, and paintings from Kunitaro Suda for example. The museum of modern art in Hayama, besides being ideally located on Hayama beach, hosts many exhibitions during the year of Japanese painters covering that period and each is worth seeing.




But it is only very recently that I came across a fabulous book: Taisho chic, about the aesthetic of Taisho period that summarizes very well the trends at that time (architecture is not covered though) and I really recommend it if you want to understand this period of Japanese history.

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