Ernest Francisco Fenollosa (February 18, 1853 – September 21, 1908) was an American art historian of

Japanese art Japanese art consists of a wide range of art styles and media that includes Jōmon pottery, ancient pottery, Japanese sculpture, sculpture, Ink wash painting, ink painting and Japanese calligraphy, calligraphy on silk and paper, Ukiyo-e, paint ...

, professor of

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

and

political economy Political or comparative economy is a branch of political science and economics studying economic systems (e.g. Marketplace, markets and national economies) and their governance by political systems (e.g. law, institutions, and government). Wi ...

Tokyo Imperial University The University of Tokyo (, abbreviated as in Japanese and UTokyo in English) is a public university, public research university in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1877 as the nation's first modern university by the merger of several Edo peri ...

. An important educator during the modernization of

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

during the

Meiji Era The was an Japanese era name, era of History of Japan, Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868, to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feu ...

, Fenollosa was an enthusiastic Orientalist who did much to preserve traditional Japanese art.

Biography

Fenollosa was born in 1853 as the son of Manuel Francisco Ciriaco Fenollosa, a Spanish pianist born in

Málaga Málaga (; ) is a Municipalities in Spain, municipality of Spain, capital of the Province of Málaga, in the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Andalusia. With a population of 591,637 in 2024, it is the second-most populo ...

in 1818, and Mary Silsbee, a member of a prominent family in Boston. He attended public schools in his hometown of

Salem, Massachusetts Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, located on the North Shore (Massachusetts), North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem was one ...

before studying

and

sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...

Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate education, undergraduate college of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Part of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Scienc ...

, where he graduated in 1874. He studied for a year at the art school of the

Boston Museum of Fine Arts Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

, during which time he married Elizabeth Goodhue Millett (1853–1920). In 1878 he was invited to Japan by American zoologist and Orientalist Edward S. Morse. Fenollosa taught political economy and philosophy at the Imperial University at Tokyo. There he also studied ancient temples, shrines and art treasures with his assistant,

Okakura Kakuzō , also known as Okakura Tenshin , was a Japanese scholar and art critic who in the era of Meiji Restoration reform promoted a critical appreciation of traditional forms, customs and beliefs. Outside Japan, he is chiefly renowned for '' The Book ...

. During his time in Japan, Fenollosa helped create the ''

nihonga ''Nihonga'' () is a Japanese style of painting that typically uses mineral pigments, and occasionally ink, together with other organic pigments on silk or paper. The term was coined during the Meiji period (1868–1912) to differentiate it from ...

'' (Japanese) style of painting with Japanese artists Kanō Hōgai (1828–1888) and Hashimoto Gahō (1835–1908). In May 1882 he delivered a lecture on "An Explanation of the Truth of Art", which was widely circulated and quoted. One of his students was the creator of judo,

Kanō Jigorō was a Japanese judoka, educator, politician, and the founder of judo. Judo was one of the first Japanese martial arts to gain widespread international recognition, and the first to become an official Olympic Games, Olympic sport. Pedagogical ...

. After eight years at the university, Fenollosa helped found the Tokyo School of Fine Arts and the Tokyo Imperial Museum. He served as director of the latter in 1888. In this period, he helped to draft the text of a law for the preservation of temples and shrines and their art treasures. Deeply influenced by living in Japan, Fenollosa converted to

Buddhism Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...

; he was given the name Teishin. He was also granted the name Kano Eitan Masanobu, placing him in the lineage of the

Kanō school The is one of the most famous schools of Japanese painting. The Kanō school of painting was the dominant style of painting from the late 15th century until the Meiji era, Meiji period which began in 1868, by which time the school had divided i ...

, who had served as painters to the Tokugawa shoguns. While resident in Japan, Fenollosa conducted the first inventory of Japan's national treasures. This resulted in the discovery of ancient Chinese scrolls, which had been brought to Japan by traveling monks centuries earlier. He was able to rescue many Buddhist artifacts that would otherwise have been destroyed under the Haibutsu kishaku movement. For these achievements, the

Emperor Meiji , posthumously honored as , was the 122nd emperor of Japan according to the List of emperors of Japan, traditional order of succession, reigning from 1867 until his death in 1912. His reign is associated with the Meiji Restoration of 1868, which ...

of Japan decorated Fenollosa with the

Order of the Rising Sun The is a Japanese honors system, Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge feat ...

and the Order of the Sacred Treasures. Fenollosa amassed a large personal collection of Japanese art during his stay in Japan. In 1886, he sold his art collection to Boston physician Charles Goddard Weld (1857–1911) on the condition that it go to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. In 1890 he returned to Boston to serve as curator of the department of Oriental Art. There Fenollosa was asked to choose Japanese art for display at the 1893

World Columbian Exposition The World's Columbian Exposition, also known as the Chicago World's Fair, was a world's fair held in Chicago from May 5 to October 31, 1893, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. The c ...

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. He also organized Boston's first exhibition of

Chinese painting Chinese painting () is one of the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world. Painting in the traditional style is known today in Chinese as , meaning "national painting" or "native painting", as opposed to Western styles of art which b ...

in 1894. In 1896, he published ''Masters of Ukiyoe'', a historical account of Japanese paintings and

ukiyo-e is a genre of Japanese art that flourished from the 17th through 19th centuries. Its artists produced woodblock printing, woodblock prints and Nikuhitsu-ga, paintings of such subjects as female beauties; kabuki actors and sumo wrestlers; scenes ...

prints exhibited at the New York Fine Arts Building. When he divorced his wife, his immediate remarriage in 1895 to writer Mary McNeill Scott (1865–1954) outraged Boston society.The Two Mrs. Fenollosas
''streetsofsalem.com'', August 5, 2016. Fenollosa was dismissed from the Museum in 1896. He returned to Japan in 1897 to accept a position as Professor of

English Literature English literature is literature written in the English language from the English-speaking world. The English language has developed over more than 1,400 years. The earliest forms of English, a set of Anglo-Frisian languages, Anglo-Frisian d ...

at the Tokyo Higher Normal School at Tokyo.

Lafcadio Hearn was a Greek-born Irish and Japanese writer, translator, and teacher who introduced the culture and literature of Japan to the Western world. His writings offered unprecedented insight into Japanese culture, especially his collections of legend ...

considered Fenollosa a friend; and Hearn almost believed that he visited the professor's home too often. In 1900, Fenollosa returned to the United States to write and lecture on Asia. He died of a heart attack during a visit to London in 1908. His body was briefly interred on the eastern side of

Highgate Cemetery Highgate Cemetery is a place of burial in North London, England, designed by architect Stephen Geary. There are approximately 170,000 people buried in around 53,000 graves across the West and East sides. Highgate Cemetery is notable both for so ...

, in London, but later cremated. According to his wishes, his ashes were returned for burial to the Hōmyō-in chapel of Mii-dera (where he had been tonsured), high above

Lake Biwa is the largest freshwater lake in Japan. It is located entirely within Shiga Prefecture (west-central Honshu), northeast of the former capital city of Kyoto. Lake Biwa is an ancient lake, over 4 million years old. It is estimated to be the 13 ...

. His tombstone was paid for by the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. Fenollosa's widow entrusted his unpublished notes on

Chinese poetry Chinese poetry is poetry written, spoken, or chanted in the Chinese language, and a part of the Chinese literature. While this last term comprises Classical Chinese, Standard Chinese, Mandarin Chinese, Yue Chinese, and other historical and vernac ...

and Japanese Noh drama to noted American poet

Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an List of poets from the United States, American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Ita ...

. Together with

William Butler Yeats William Butler Yeats (, 13 June 186528 January 1939), popularly known as W. B. Yeats, was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer, and literary critic who was one of the foremost figures of 20th century in literature, 20th-century literature. He was ...

, Pound used the notes to stimulate the growing interest in Far Eastern literature among modernist writers. Pound subsequently finished Fenollosa's work with the aid of

Arthur Waley Arthur David Waley (born Arthur David Schloss, 19 August 188927 June 1966) was an English orientalist and sinologist who achieved both popular and scholarly acclaim for his translations of Chinese and Japanese poetry. Among his honours were ...

, the noted British

sinologist Sinology, also referred to as China studies, is a subfield of area studies or East Asian studies involved in social sciences and humanities research on China. It is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of the Chinese civilizatio ...

. Concentrating on Japanese art before 1800, it was published in two volumes in 1912. Fenollosa offered

Hokusai , known mononymously as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. His woodblock printing in Japan, woodblock print series ''Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji'' includes the iconic print ''The Gr ...

's prints as a window of beauty after Japanese art had become too modern for his own taste: "Hokusai is a great designer, as Kipling and Whitman are great poets. He has been called the

Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by many as the great ...

of Japan." Arthur Wesley Dow said of Fenollosa that "he was gifted with a brilliant mind of great analytical power, this with a rare appreciation gave him an insight into the nature of fine art such as few ever attain".

Criticism

At a Harvard lecture of 2011, Benjamin Elman refers to the ''Epochs of the Chinese and Japanese Art'' (1912) where Fenollosa compares "degeneration" of the late imperial Chinese art to that which befell the high antique art of Europe in Byzantium ("the poorest of the Byzantine mosaics"; "the only hope for the hopeless is to perceive itself to be hopeless"). According to Elman, Fenollosa's perception was influenced by the political and military defeats of the Qing empire.Reischauer Lectures, Harvard University 2011
00:52 ff.

Notes

Bibliography

* ''East and West, The Discovery of American and Other Poems'', New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., 1983. * ''The Masters of Ukioye: a Complete Historical Description of Japanese Paintings and Color Prints of the Genre School'', New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1896. *
Epochs of Chinese and Japanese Art
', London: William Heinemann, 1912. * ''Certain Noble Plays of Japan from the manuscripts of Ernest Fenollosa'', edited by Ezra Pound with introduction by William Butler Yeats, The Cuala Press, 1916. *
"Noh" or Accomplishment: A Study of the Classical Stage of Japan
', with

, London: Macmillan and Co., 1916. Rpt. ''The Classic Noh Theatre of Japan'', New York: New Directions, 1959. *
The Chinese Written Character as a Medium for Poetry
', edited by

after the author's death, 1918. * ''The Chinese Written Character as a Medium for Poetry: A Critical Edition'', edited Haun Saussy, Jonathan Stalling & Lucas Klein, Fordham University Press, 2008.

External links

* * *
Read Fenollosa's Epochs of Chinese & Japanese Art on line
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fenollosa, Ernest 1853 births 1908 deaths Burials at Highgate Cemetery 19th-century American historians 19th-century Japanese people 20th-century American philosophers 19th-century American philosophers American people of Catalan descent Foreign advisors to the government in Meiji-era Japan Harvard College alumni Foreign educators in Japan Academic staff of the University of Tokyo American expatriates in Japan American Japanologists Museum of Fine Arts, Boston American Buddhists Japanese Buddhists Converts to Buddhism Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun Recipients of the Order of the Sacred Treasure People from Salem, Massachusetts Shinbutsu bunri American Tendai Buddhists 19th-century American Buddhists 20th-century American Buddhists

Biography

Criticism

See also

Notes

Bibliography

Further reading

External links