Old Taoist: The Life, Art and Poetry of Kodojin (1865-1944) Book

Rooting around in a Kyoto antique shop, Stephen Addiss came across a fine example of literati painting by a hand he didn't recognise. Little did he know then that he had discovered an artist he now calls the last of Japan's great literati, Fukuda Kodojin. Kodojin, who styled himself "Old Taoist", should have gone the way of other scholarly effetes with Japan's radical 19th-century modernisation. Instead, he wandered in the boundless realms of the three treasures--painting, poetry and calligraphy--until his death in 1944. Addiss had discovered the genuine article, a scholar of cultured sensibility who had mastered the ancient Chinese arts and expressed them with a style all his own. Addiss introduces us to that style through dozens of examples of his painting and calligraphy, and over 250 poems. To translate the Chinese language poetry, he recruited Jonathan Chaves, who shows Kodojin's work to be elegant and wistful, echoing themes of Confucianism and Taoism. Kodojin's work transports us back to a time when art was a way of communicating among friends and not cheapened by exchanges of money. Old Taoist reminds us that even in a modern world, the pursuits of beauty and genuineness are not only possible but necessary. --Brian BruyaRead More