The Sazaidō Hall at the Five Hundred Rakan Temple (五百羅漢さゞゐ堂, Gohyaku Rakan Sazaidō), 1857, Hiroshige
We find beauty not in the thing itself but in the patterns of shadows, the light and the darkness, that one thing against another creates ... Were it not for shadows, there would be no beauty.
The quality that we call beauty ... must always grow from the realities of life.
– 陰翳礼讃
my first book of 2025 is a 1933 essay by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, one of japan's greatest 20th novelists, on japanese aesthetics, translated by Thomas J. Harper and Edward Seidensticker.
a vagrant style ranging from toilets to lacquerware, to blackening teeth and persimmon leaf sushi, this book was a fun little portal into mr Tanizaki's philosophy on architecture, drama, food, feminine beauty, and many other aspects of Japanese sense of beauty.
it made me appreciate the tranquil world of darkness and shadows, that allows japanese culture like kabuki theater, shadow play, moon-viewing, and tea ceremony to thrive.
i love the contrast between the softer, quieter, shadowy aesthetics in the old temples and houses and the brighter, more garish Western packed with blinding and scorching electric lights. and in daily objects:
- the writing brush vs fountain pen
- chinese and japanese paper (warm and calm, envelops light and is quiet and pliant as the leaf of a tree) vs western paper (turns away from the light)
- tin with patina and lacquerware (beauty in darkness) vs polished silver and steel
- impure and cloudy jade (a sheen of antiquity) vs bright chilean crystals, glittering diamond, ruby, and emerald
how instead of sparkling white walls, uniforms, and equipments in hospitals, patients could lie on tatami mats surrounded by sand-colored walls of a Japanese room. his love for darkness in Noh compared to Kabuki, and towards the end, he talks about the the conveniences of modern culture growing increasingly inconsiderate of old people, the beauty of the suburbs being turned over to the masses, denuded of trees, and western aesthetic ideals have become the new standard, as light is being valued over darkness. he wishes, at least, for literature, that the world of shadows to return, have the eaves deep and the walls dark, push back things into the shadows, strip away the useless decorations, for mansions to turn off their electric lights.
for a visual companion, this documentary by NHK world contains scenes where they demonstrate how the mournful beauty of lacquerware and a gold screen comes to life in darkness, with only soft candlelights dancing across them.
I have to get my hands on the vintage classics version with full illustrations one day.
ending this with a few quotes i liked
on sun and architecture
“The sun never knew how wonderful it was,” the architect Louis Kahn said, “until it fell on the wall of a building,”
if the japanese invented everything
But it is on occasions like this that I always think how different everything would be if we in the Orient had developed our own science. Suppose for instance that we had developed our own physics and chemistry: would not the techniques and industries based on them have taken a different form, would not our myriads of everyday gadgets, our medicines, the products of our industrial art - would they not have suited our national temper better than they do?
and being content
We Orientals tend to seek our satisfactions in whatever surroundings we happen to find ourselves, to content ourselves with things as they are; and so darkness causes us no discontent, we resign ourselves to it as inevitable. If light is scarce, then light is scarce; we will immerse ourselves in the darkness and there discover its own particular beauty. But the progressive Westerner is determined always to better his lot. From candle to oil lamp, oil lamp to gaslight, gaslight to electric light—his quest for a brighter light never ceases, he spares no pains to eradicate even the minutest shadow