Review of Landscape gardener Ogawa Jihei and his times: A profile of modern Japan

In the late 1880s the prefecture of Kyoto undertook a grand infrastructural project, the Lake Biwa Canal. The canal connected Japan’s largest lake to the eastern parts of the country’s former capital. Initially, the canal’s waterpower was intended to drive the wheels of newly established mills. However, during the process of building the canal, the planners realized that hydroelectricity would ultimately replace mechanical waterpower, and a hydroelectric power station was built at Keage, in the vicinity of the Nanzen Temple district. Furthermore, the canal helped irrigate rice paddies and carry agricultural products to the city. The grand scheme of the Lake Biwa Canal was one of several steps taken in this era to regain the ground that was symbolically and economically lost after the imperial court moved to Tokyo.

Suzuki devotes roughly the first 50 pages of his book to the canal’s planning and construction. He investigates the field trips that the canal’s young engineer, Tanabe Sakurō, made to cities in the USA, which had thrived on canals and waterpower since the mid-19th century. Suzuki also analyzes the complex political fabric surrounding the project in great depth. Opening a book on a landscape gardener in this way may seem surprising at first. However, Ogawa Jihei’s first famous gardens were all built along the canal in the emerging affluent neighborhood on the former grounds of Nanzen Temple. These gardens all used water brought into the city by the channel to a tremendous scenic effect. Ogawa’s gardens became famous for the small streams crossing them and the soothing effects that the sound of water induced in owners and visitors alike. Since the canal had lost its initial function of driving watermills, the garden owners were able to use the surplus of water for purely scenic purposes. It allowed them to create places full of water in a city where this was previously impossible due to water scarcity, and stones had to be used to symbolize water. Thus, the history of the Lake Biwa Canal is inseparable from Ogawa’s early career, which would define his further biography in modern Japan. Instead of commencing with an analysis of the characteristics of Ogawa’s gardens or his biography, Suzuki immediately situates Ogawa’s story in the context of Japan’s modernization. This also entails that the book relinquishes a general introduction of the supposedly timeless qualities of Japanese gardens – a trope long exhausted by an endless succession of uninspired books on the topic.

Suzuki largely follows this strategy throughout his book. Through the gardens of Ogawa and the circumstances that nourished them, he tells a rich socio-economic story about the tastes and conditions of a strata of wealthy and influential owners. After introducing the canal, the reader learns why politicians like Yamagata Aritomo, Ogawa’s most famous and important patron, engaged in an art which seemed to be in decline after the end of Tokugawa rule in 1868. By commissioning his garden at Murinan in East Kyoto, Yamagata jumpstarted Ogawa’s career. Not only did he introduce the hitherto unknown gardener to his peers. Yamagata also shaped Ogawa’s aesthetic sense by working alongside him to create a fresh and unique experience at Murinan. The resulting landscape marked a new phase in Japanese garden history. After Yamagata’s intervention, Ogawa’s gardens abandoned the deep symbolic layer that old Kyoto gardens would become famous for in the 20th century. Instead, places like Murinan were considered to be naturalistic, almost in a modern Western sense, and as a result they adopted a more eclectic approach instead of continuing older patterns. Suzuki then follows up on Ogawa’s career via later gardens from Kyoto to Tokyo and introduces his subsequent patrons as well as their motives. The result is a tableau of political and economic power that tells a story about how they came to be legitimated through culture.

Suzuki’s ability to cut through the tense and complicated socio-economic layers of society is certainly fascinating. However, his book is somewhat lacking in a discussion of the relationship between Japaneseness and Western influences as expressed in naturalism. Suzuki only rarely touches on the delicate question of aesthetics or the problematic notion of authenticity. Only at the very end of his book does he venture some insights on how later garden historians and specialists like Nakane Kinsaku and Tono Takuma thought about Ogawa’s achievements. Indeed, Ogawa’s gardens were not deemed worthy parts of Japanese garden history for many decades. His open vistas and lack of symbolism would make some of the leading voices of Japanese garden history, like Shigemori Mirei, turn against him. Their verdict weighed heavily on Ogawa’s gardens.

Over the last three decades, however, the tides have turned in Ogawa’s favor. Since then, Ogawa has been rendered into a quintessential modernizer of alleged Japanese garden history. Authors like Shirahata Yōzaburō, professor at the International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken) in Kyoto, and Amasaki Hiromasa, professor at Kyōto University of Art and Design, began taking an interest in Ogawa during the 1980s. Amasaki in particular helped draw public attention to Ogawa’s artistic achievements, and his research not only laid the groundwork for further analysis, but also for much broader public recognition. Since then Ogawa has not only captured the attention of garden scholars; his gospel has also infiltrated popular culture. Today, he is a staple in TV programs and journals.

Suzuki’s work and book have been an important part of this growing vogue. The book under review actually appeared in Japanese in 2013. Alongside Shirahata’s (2016) Daimyō Gardens, which extends to Ogawa as a modern heir of daimyō garden culture, and Wybe Kuitert’s (2017) excellent new book Japanese Gardens and Landscapes, 1650–1950, this new English translation brings Ogawa to the attention of a Western readership. In the context of these publications, Suzuki stands out for offering a broad socio-economic vision and drawing fascinating connections between gardening and the emergence of modern Japan. Apart from being eminently knowledgeable, his account clearly benefits from an outstanding architectural competence and an understanding of social changes in the late 19th century. Though Suzuki’s detailed description of social networks may be slightly confusing for Western readers, his general attempt to embed Ogawa’s biography in the context of the Meiji, Taishō, and early Shōwa eras is, without a doubt, fascinating. Unfortunately, Suzuki himself did not live to see the publication of his seminal work in English. The architectural historian died in 2014.