Bamboo grove, Fukiage garden of the Imperial Palace

Category

Library Item

Item no

15128

Title

Bamboo grove, Fukiage garden of the Imperial Palace, Tokyo.

Description

View of the main path in the bamboo grove of the Fukiage garden, part of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo.
The sections of bamboo and other trees are held behind cut bamboo fencings. Two gardeners are standing on the path, both wearing short blue kimonos with red belts and towels over their heads.
The photograph was hand-painted with great care in orange, blue, and various shades of green.

Artist / maker

von Stillfried-Ratenicz, Franz

Date

1881

Size

19.5 x 24 cm

Type

Photograph

Location

Art and Design Library

This item is part of a collection of prints from the studio of Baron Franz von Stillfried-Ratenicz, an Austrian photographer practising in Japan in the late 1870's. Von Stillfried ran a studio in Yokohama at the same time as his brother Raimund, who was also known as 'Baron Stillfried'. This caused a great deal of confusion with the local residents and visitors to Japan in the Meiji Period, and with art historians today.

This album, which dates from 1879-83, comprises 67 separate mounted prints presented in a lacquerware box. Albums of this kind were popular among foreign tourists, who frequently selected the individual prints they wished to include from the studio's collection. Many of these albumen prints were hand tinted. This was a laborious process for which von Stillfried employed, at the height of his success, a substantial number of Japanese workers.

Before being a garden, this area was occupied by the private residences of feudal lords seeking the protection of the nearby Edo Castle. However, in 1657 a huge fire (the great fire of the Meireki Period, also called Furisode Fire) destroyed most of the city. These habitations were burnt down and it was decided to convert the area to a garden. At first, this garden consisted of a wide field of wild flowers among which was a pavillon called 'Hana-Batake Goten' or the 'Palace of the Field of Flowers'.
In the late seventeenth century, the 5th Shogun Tokugawa Tsunayoshi decided to redesign this area of the city and excavated moats, built residences, tea houses and shrines. The new structures surrounding the garden bore such names as "Maple Arbour," "Cascade-viewing Arbour," "Country House," "Pine-tree Tea-house," and "Shrine of the Water-fall." The garden was re-designed with great care, right down to the location of each stone and tree.

The bamboo in the Fukiage Garden (meaning litterally the 'blown clean garden') were planted by the 8th Shogun Tokugawa Yoshimune circa 1725. The government funds were very limited, which is the reason why bamboo (which is cheap and easy to grow) was chosen for the garden.

The palace is still used as the private residence of the Emperor and his family and the Fukiage Garden is used as their residential garden. It is said that Emperor Showa (1926-1989) was used to digging up bamboo shoots there. These Imperial grounds cover an area of about eighty-five acres and the bamboo grove in the picture can still be seen today. It stretches to the right towards the Hanz?mon Gate of the Imperial Palace.

The University of Nagasaki owns another version of this photograph in which the trees and the men's outfits were hand-painted in different shades of brown. The Fukiage Garden was a popular subject and many photographs of the bamboo groves are still kept in collections throughout the world today.

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Related images

Related subjects

Clothing and dress > Garments > Kimonos

Landscape > Landscape architectural facilities > Gardens

People > Adults > Men

Places > Asia > Japan

Plants > Grasses > Bamboo