graduate school directory 2011/12 - Camberwell College of Arts ...

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WATANABE Toshio
PROfESSOR
BiOgrAPhY Professor Toshio Watanabe is
Director of the Transnational Art, Identity and
Nation (TrAIN) research centre. He studied at
the Universities of Sophia, Tokyo, Courtauld Institute
of Art, London and in Basel, where he
completed his PhD. He has taught at the City of
Birmingham Pol ytechnic, where he ran the
MA in History of Art and Design course. He has
been at Chelsea since 1986, initially as the
Head of Art History and later as Head of Research.
Professor Watanabe is an art historian, studying
mostly the period 1850–1950, who is interested
in exploring how art of different places and cultures
intermingle and affect each other. Current
external roles include acting as Vice President
of CIHA (Comité International d’Histoire de l’Art)
and as Chair of International Jury of Künstlerhaus
Schloss Balmoral, Bad Ems, Germany.
rESEArCh StAtEMENt The main focus of my
research is transnational interactions of art
with an emphasis on the issue of modernity and
identity. I am particularly interested in exploring
this, not just in bilateral, but in multilateral
relationships, such as those between Japan, China,
Taiwan, India, Britain or the USA within the
time span between 1850 and 1950. My interest in
transnational relationships covers all media,
but particularly architecture, garden design, watercolour
painting, photography and popular
graphics. Particular emphasis is put on the consumption
of these art forms locally and globally.
Projects being undertaken include the following
themes: the theory of modern landscape and
imperial architecture in Japan, 1880s–1940s; the
history and reception of the modern Japanese
garden; the construction of Japanese Art History;
British Japonisme.
SELECtED OUtPUtS AND AChiEVEMENtS
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
2010 ‘Why Censor a Nude Painting? Kuroda Seiki and the
Nude Painting Controversy’, in: Sakae Murakami-Giroux
et al (eds), Censure, Autocensure et Tabous, Arles:
Philippe Picquier.
2010 ‘The Modern Japanese Garden in a Transnational
Context’, in: Lieselotte E. Saurma-Jeltsch & Anja
Eisenbeiss (eds), The Power of Things and the flow of
Cultural Transformations, Berlin: Deutsche Kunst Verlag.
2010 ‘The Establishment of the Concept of Nature in Modern
Japan’, in: Sensing Nature: Rethinking of the Japanese
Perception of Nature, exhibition catalogue, Mori Museum
of Art, Tokyo.
2008 ‘Modernism: Self and Other Represented In (Or By
Incorporating) Other’s Style’, in: Self and Other: Portraits
from Asia and Europe, exhibition catalogue, National
Museum of Ethnology, Osaka.
SELECTED PRESENTATIONS AND CONfERENCE
PAPERS
2011 ‘British View of the Japanese Landscape: from
Wirgman to Conder’, lecture at Kanagawa Prefectural
History Museum, Yokohama.
2011 ‘Mizue: an Alternative Art Magazine Promoting
Anglophilia, Modern Landscape and Watercolor
Movement’, AAS/ICAS conference at Honolulu.
2010 ‘What is Japonisme: Terminology and Interpretation’,
International Conference at the Manggha Museum of
Japanese Art and Technology, Krakow.
2010 Keynote, ‘20th Century Japonisme: Its Story between
1920s and 1950s’, International Conference on
Orientalism/Occidentalism at Russian Academy of State
Service under the President of the Russian federation,
Moscow.
2010 Convenor, forgotten Japonisme Conference,
V&A, and paper ‘Transnational Identity of a Garden:
Gardens of Manzanar Internment Camp,
California and Queen Lili’uokalani Garden at Hilo,
Hawaii’.
2009 ‘The Historiography of the Study of American and
British Japonisme’, symposium on American and British
Japonisme, Bunka Women’s College, Tokyo. Organized
jointly by the Society for the Study of Japonisme and
TrAIN research centre.
SELECTED AWARDS
2008–09 Anglo-Japanese Daiwa foundation, Sensing Cities
project with Aoyama Gakuin University (PI) and Bartlett
School of Architecture, UCL.
2007–10 AHRC grant, ‘forgotten Japonisme’, major threeyear
research project.
WATANABE Toshio
Queen Lili’uokalani Garden at Hilo, Hawaii. Photo: Toshio Watanabe
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