화단개혁, 근대초극, 추상미술 - 전쟁기(1930-1945) 일본에서의 ‘전위’로서의 비평가 운동

Abstract

After World War Ⅱ, the thought that Japanese art history was “blank” or “darkness” has been generalized in the Japanese art world. The reason was that during the war period the ‘freedom’ of artist was violated and the “abstract art as avant-garde” was suppressed. The National Museum of Modern Art(NMMA, established in 1952) was the hypocenter of formulating such a thought institutionally. However, the thought of ‘art history as “blank” or “darkness”’ was possible by pushing out the historical memory of art critics who created and generalized such thought. Because the period of “blank” and “darkness” was the time when the existence and function of art criticism was most keenly discussed and the collective movement of art critics was most actively developed. I, therefore, intended to probe the historical situation which art criticism was established and the self-consciousness of art critics was born in Japan, and to get to the bottom of art criticism and art critics’ movement during wartime which has been regarded as “blank” or “darkness.” The art criticism and the social mission of art critics in Japan was elicited from the movement that criticized and tried to reform Gadan[art world] established with the introduction of the concept of ‘Art’. The problem was that such Gadan caused the loss of true art by breeding the retrospective ‘modern art,’ which reinforced Gadan system, and the ‘modernism,’ a synonym for blind imitation of new European Arts. As a result, there emerged the thought that they should reform Gadan for realize true art. In the 1930s when Japan entered into the war period, the will to reform Gadan was also developed as an organized reformative movement. The central subject of that movement was “young artists” who newly appeared in the 1930s, and the collective art critics who supported “young artists” and asserted the social mission of art criticism. As a first step, those reformative art critics criticized the problem of “criticism by artists” connected to Gadan system, and tried to make “criticism by critics” independent as the only professional criticism. Marxist art critics formulated such declaration of independence in advance. They regarded Marxism as the theoretical weapon for the independence of “criticism by critics.” At the same time, they regarded “young artists” who was suppressed and isolated by the established Gadan system as the subject of Gadan reformation. The will to reform Gadan, the recapture of hegemony of art criticism by art critics, and the support to “young artists” was shared by critics of abstract art such as Imaizumi Atsuo and Uemura Takachiyo. But while Marxist art critics expected artistic revolution through political revolution based on historical materialism, Imaizumi and Uemura showed the vision of political revolution though artistic revolution exerted by the grammar of abstract art. For Imaizumi and Uemura, abstract art was an alternative which had never been realized but should be realized in Japanese art world. By denying the established Gadan totally and suggesting abstract art as an alternative, normative form, they regarded art critics as the only ‘Zen-Ei[avant-garde]’ going before artists. In other words, art critics became ‘Zen-ei’ in the meaning that they were reformers and prophets and leaders. And their Gadan reformation was provoked by the inherent character of abstract art. The character that does not imitate outside world, i.e., does not affirm outside world, made it possible to concretize new vision for outside world and to become a kind of plan to reform the world. By that, Overcoming ‘modern art’ and ‘modernism’ by abstract art became the starting point of great vision extending to world reformation, and at the same time, art critics also became a cultural ‘Zen-Ei’ who were expected to reform society, nation state, and finally all the world beyond artistic ‘Zen-Ei.’ Important point was that their reformative vision required the strong power of nation state. Consequently, they transmitted their utopian vision upon the political reform by the ‘Shin-Taisei[New Order]’ during wartime. That is, they welcomed the ‘Shin-Taisei’ and agreed gladly the ‘regulation’ of art by government, based on the logical development from abstract art to world reformation. For them, ‘Shin-Taisei’ was the powerful system and valuable chance to clean up the evil of Gadan. So, they desired the establishment of powerful ‘cultural policies’ by government and insisted they should become the agents of ‘cultural policies.’ Such reformative vision by critics of abstract art accompanied the reorganization of global geopolitics. While they denied Paris by regarding her as the origin of capitalistic, commercialistic Gadan system, they searched the alternative model for creating new Japanese art from the public art project in the New Deal America, and the cultural policies of Germany and Italy. These models were elicited from the will to let art go back to society and to establish nationalized art, and justified firmly by the fall of Paris by Hitler in 1940. But after the U.S. participated into the World War Ⅱ in 1941, the American model was abandoned and just Germany’s and Italy’s cultural policies were regarded as good model for ‘cultural policies’ of ‘Shin-Taisei.’ With the end of World War Ⅱ, however, the Japanese art world hurried up the recovery of Ecole de Paris, and moved to see how Americam art world was going on. The interest in American art world resulted from the international power of America in the postwar era, which made the geopolitics of abstract art reorganized, too. Abstract art after World War Ⅱ, was circulated as international visual language that had the ideal of freedom and democracy under the Cold War system. Given such like new status and meaning to abstract art, the totalitarian past of abstract art during wartime was sealed within the art history of “blank” and “darkness.” But this oblivion could not be understood as passive adjustment to the ideological and cultural situation after the defeat of war. Because the Gadan reform by the reformative art critics continued. NMMA, formulating the art history of “blank” and “darkness”, was the institution of ‘cultural policies’ managed by that reformative art critics, and for those art critics, NMMA was the base for the “museum’s struggle” severing relations with the Gadan system and creating new Japanese contemporary art and Japanese modern art history.