Meiji Photographs: A Historic Friendship between Japan and Rutgers

Kusakabe-Griffis Room

Among the Zimmerli’s treasures is a group of more than two hundred photographs taken by European and Japanese photographers during the Meiji period (1868-1912), considered the beginning of the modern era in Japan. This exhibition presents a selection of these photographs featuring famous sites in Japan and studio photographs of Japanese culture by such important photographers as Felice Beato (1834-1907), a war photographer who established a studio in Yokohama—the first center of photography in Japan—and his former assistant Kusakabe Kimbei (Japanese, 1841-1932).

Among the first Japanese students to attend an American university was Taro Kusakabe, a young samurai from Echizen province, which became known as Fukui Prefecture in 1889, who came to Rutgers. He tragically died from tuberculosis weeks before his graduation in 1870 (his diploma was awarded posthumously). Kusakabe’s tutor William Elliot Grifis (1843–1928; Rutgers College, 1869) was invited to Fukui in 1870 to help modernize its schools. He returned to the United States in 1874. His study of Japanese history and culture The Mikado’s Empire (1876) is among the most important early works in English on Japan.

This remarkable period of exchange between Japan and Rutgers coincides with the growing interest in Japanese art by Western artists, who began to incorporate Japanese motifs, compositional structures, and techniques into their artwork during the 1860s. The Zimmerli’s strong collection of Japonisme—late nineteenth-century European and American works influenced by the art of Japan—commemorates the spirit of discovery and reciprocity between East and West.

The exhibition is open to the public every Saturday and Sunday during regular museum hours.

Organized by Christine Giviskos, Associate Curator of European Art