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Kumano Nachi Mandalas: Medieval Landscape, Medieval National Identity

abstract: A Japanese national identity is generally thought to have originated in the 17th century, with the advent of the Kokugaku movement. I will argue that there is earlier evidence for the existence of a Japanese national identity in the Kumano Nachi mandalas of the Kamakura and Muromachi periods. These mandalas employ the Nachi waterfall as a symbol of the strength and power of the Japanese land, counterbalancing Chinese Buddhist visual motifs. In this paper, I further assert that these mandalas are an early example of an artistic tradition of painting specific landscape features as symbols of a Japanese national identity, and that this tradition continues into the modern period. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Art History 2017

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:asu.edu/item:46262
Date January 2017
ContributorsGossett, Sarah E. (Author), Brown, Claudia (Advisor), Codell, Julie (Committee member), Gabbard, Ralph (Committee member), Hedberg, William (Committee member), Arizona State University (Publisher)
Source SetsArizona State University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeMasters Thesis
Format51 pages
Rightshttp://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/, All Rights Reserved

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