Word: edo
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...throaty protagonist locked in combat with the rest of the orchestra. Hard driving and explosive, the piece erupts from a single rhythmic idea that propels the music forward relentlessly. Even the moody slow movement cannot dilute the restless surge, which continues undaunted right to the final bar. Under Conductor Edo de Waart, the San Francisco players gave the 'Cello Symphony a committed, accomplished performance...
...tolerated, though watched closely, by the shogunate. Originally the term "floating world," or ukiyo, referred to the Buddhist notion that the everyday grind of travail and tears is ephemeral. Yet the proprietors and patrons of the leisure districts that sprang up on the outskirts of Edo (Tokyo), Kyoto and Osaka in the 1600s turned that concept on its head. Life was to be savored. "Living only for the moment, turning our full attention to the pleasures of the moon, the snow, the cherry blossoms and the maples," as novelist Asai Ryoi wrote in 1661, "singing songs, drinking wine, and diverting...
...printmakers had learned how to run a sheet of paper over two identical wood blocks, each one inked in a different color. By the 1740s several blocks were being used for a single picture, and luxurious calendars featuring polychrome prints became popular as New Year's gifts among smart Edo residents. King of the calendar prints was Suzuki Harunobu, whose Beauty Taking the Air by a River (1765-66), of a slender young woman in a subtle rose kimono, is one of the best among his dozens in the show...
...influence of Okyo's work can be seen in a series of rooms commissioned 80 years later and painted by late-Edo master Gantai in the 1840s. His screens, like Okyo's, each have its own theme; they are filled with dazzling gold reeds, rushes, trees and butterflies. But by this time, figurative depiction had become so sophisticated that the butterflies look real, as if they are ready to fly off the screen...
...Especially on the top floor?where the treasures include pieces from before the rise of Buddhism in 6th century B.C. through the 18th century Edo period?the exhibitions benefit tremendously from the museum's emphasis on selective presentation. Many rooms feature only a handful of pieces, encouraging visitors to take a closer look instead of a flyby glance at 30 works in 30 seconds. "Our approach is for art appreciation, not mass exhibitionism," explains curator Yuji Dainobu...