The Japanese Garden

In Japan, the garden has always been defined as a dialogue between man and nature, and the niwashi, master gardeners, have always created new gardens in keeping with tradition. It is curious to understand how the idea of ​​innovation is inherent in the Japanese concept of tradition: there is no tradition without innovation. The article analyses how some compositional elements of the classical tradition of the Japanese garden have been reinterpreted, interpreted or simply re-proposed in some contemporary creations present in Japan. These are not only creations by Japanese landscape architects but, on the contrary, also works by Western authors who have successfully undertaken the arduous path of the garden.

“The Japanese landscape” is not just nature, not simply spontaneous nature, as the literal translation of the Japanese word nature – shizen – would lead us to believe. The Japanese garden has always been nature created by man. It belongs to the realm of architecture and is, to put it better, nature as an art form” (Günter Nitschke, 1999).

In Japan, the garden has always been defined as a dialogue between man and nature, and the niwashi, master gardeners, have always created new gardens in keeping with tradition. It is curious to understand how the idea of ​​innovation is inherent in the Japanese concept of tradition: there is no tradition without innovation. The call of the signs and geometries typical of the classical garden is accompanied by a continuous and ever new expressive research that, for decades now, has also drawn from the Western repertoire.

Many authors, such as Arata Isozaki, Bruno Taut and Alessandro Villari agree that modern Japanese landscape design has been influenced by Western fashion, but the same authors agree that, very often, the same classical tradition of the Japanese garden has become, for the Western world, an example to imitate and reinterpret in a modern key. And it is on these themes that the concept of innovation-tradition will be explored below. We will analyze how some compositional elements of the classical tradition of the Japanese garden have been reinterpreted, interpreted or simply re-proposed in some contemporary creations present in Japan. As we will see, these are not only creations by Japanese landscape designers but, on the contrary, also works by Western authors who have successfully undertaken the arduous path of the garden.

The Japanese Garden

The classical theory of the Japanese garden is generally based on three compositional principles that define the spatial and volumetric organization of the landscape: the miniature landscape (shukkei), the borrowed landscape (shakkei) and the dry landscape of contemplation (karesansui). In addition to understanding the meaning and practical implications of these compositional principles in landscape design, we will also mention the technique of sumikake (corner connection) and the way in which, in the Japanese tradition dating back to the Edo period (1603-1868), the framing of any natural image is organised, the so-called glimpse view. These last two compositional aspects will allow us to understand some of the design choices illustrated and will be useful for defining the very Japanese way of observing the landscape, whether it is an urban environment or glimpses of nature. 

Il Edo period (1603-1868) was a long and wonderful cycle of growth and consolidation of Japanese aesthetic canons.
It is during this period that the great artists of theukiyoe (the so-called floating world), such as Hokusai (1760-1849) and Hiroshige (1797-1858), and it is in these centuries that the pictorial art of organizing the landscape or any natural subject, such as a flower or a fish, achieved the compositional clarity that we appreciate today.
Trying to define in an academic and schematic way the characteristics that define the so-called foreshortened vision of the subject, we could assert that the subject ritratto it's not in the center of the frame, is often in the background and, sometimes, we observe an element that comes between us and the subject itself. This very Japanese way of organizing the shot determines in the observer a increase in participation to the portrayed scene; this is because curiosity and the desire to see the hidden part of the subject take over; moreover, more often than not, one has the impression that what comes between us and the subject originates behind us and, therefore, physically accompanies us into the image itself.

To further clarify this very Japanese way of framing the landscape, let's try to observe the same subject portrayed both with a typically Western shot and with a shot defined by the foreshortened vision of the subject. Photos 2 and 3 portray the Murina-an garden (Kyoto) designed by Ogawa Jihei, a well-known landscape artist of the Meiji era (1868-1912). This is a work that has undergone English influence not only in the organization of the hilly volumes, very similar to the wise full and empty spaces of the English landscape garden, but also in the architecture of the house, which is in a clear Anglo-Saxon style.

Beyond the composition and the history that distinguish this garden, we observe how the first photograph (photo 2) has a clear Western setting: the stream portrayed is in the center, all the other compositional elements act almost as a frame for the subject and nothing prevails over what was decided to portray. By graphically analyzing the figure, we can assert that, in this case, the image can be defined and schematized through a perspective study with a central vanishing point: the vanishing lines converge toward the center, which always hosts the portrayed subject.
It is the opinion of the writer that this graphic setting can be defined as symmetrical and equal.

Resuming what we stated previously about Hokusai's pictorial work, the subject is not in the center but, on the contrary, is moved to the right and is in the background; furthermore, a maple branch, which obviously originates from a plant that is behind us, accompanies us into the image and partly masks what is portrayed beyond the leaves. It increases our curiosity to continue the journey in the image to be able to admire the river and the hills. Compared to the previous photograph, this image can be defined as asymmetrical and dynamic. 

If in the so-called static gardens of contemplation, where there is an evident preferential point from which to observe the garden, one can imagine an easy spatial organization with a foreshortened view of the subject, in the numerous classical strolling gardens the doubt remains as to how this compositional character can be realized. In this regard, we recall the garden of the Katsura Imperial Villa (17th century) in Kyoto, considered, rightly, one of the greatest examples of enshugonomi (literally in the manner of Enshu Kobori, a well-known garden designer of the early Edo period) as well as one of the most important Japanese roji (tea gardens).

As Arata Isozaki teaches and as, before him, Bruno Taut had exposed in his travel diaries, the organization of the space around the villa is based on the principle of walking to reach the destination, which, in the case of the present garden, consists of the various tea ceremonial houses. One walks along the paths and paths of the garden almost as if it were a pilgrimage from one tea house to another, from one architecture to another.
This is one of the gardens in which the beauty of the work is inherent in the walkway and the movement from one area of ​​the landscape to another. Along the paths the view of the panorama is often hidden by the vegetation and not infrequently the walkways are so impervious that we have to lower our gaze on our steps, taking our attention away from the scene that surrounds us. All this is desired and sought by the designer. In fact, our gaze returns to the landscape only in those points of the garden, which we could still define as preferential viewpoints, studied and organized by the landscape designer drawing on the classic technique of the foreshortened vision of the subject.

After having walked along a long path immersed in a thicket that blocks the view of the lake, after having walked along paths, sometimes “naturally” uneven, after having glimpsed and imagined the architecture and the lake between the leaves of the trees, we arrive where the path makes a slight curve to the left and with amazement the scene that opens up before our eyes is clearly organized as a foreshortening.

The teahouse we admire is partly hidden by a pine tree which, in turn, is in the background compared to an ancient lantern that attracts our attention. Furthermore, the teahouse is not aligned with our progress and is oriented in another direction that most likely points towards an element of the landscape that we cannot see because it is masked by other trees and islands. Our curiosity to see what can be admired from such a fascinating architecture is such that it leads us to continue the journey to reach this house from where, with surprise, we will observe another scene organized with a glimpse of the subject, which will once again fuel our curiosity to see what is partially hidden.
All this expands the space, increases the depth and makes us participants in the landscape.

The corner connection and the foreshortened view

In parallel to the image organization technique described above, there is the so-called corner connection (sumikake), which consists of arranging the walkways and the lines of the buildings along a zigzagging line. This process along lines perpendicular to each other allows for the creation of ever new views since, following the change of direction, previously hidden and unimagined landscapes open up. Photo 5 shows some views of the long zigzag that characterizes the entrance to the Koto-in temple (XNUMXth century), part of the Daitoku-ji complex in Kyoto. It is evident how in such a limited space the sumikake technique manages to enormously expand the surfaces and how it allows for ever new panoramas to be obtained. Note also how the opening onto the garden that can be admired at the end of the last path is organized with the technique of foreshortening the subject described above.

The entrance to the hotel is completely similar. Honpuku-ji Temple (Shinto temple dedicated to water) designed by Tadao Ando in 1991 on Awaji Island in Osaka Bay. In this case, however, the famous architect skillfully introduces the curved line, a graphic aspect rarely present in the classical tradition of the Japanese garden.
The zigzagging of the first part of the walkway leads into a gentle curve that gradually reveals the panorama beyond the white circular wall: the large water lily basin which, in addition to being an unexpected element of surprise, is also the roof of the temple below.
See the project also available in dwg format…>> 

These two compositional aspects, the foreshortened view of the subject and the sumikake, are typical elements of Japanese aesthetics and are still reread and interpreted today in modern landscape creations, which we can include in each of the keys to reading the landscape proposed by Villari: the miniature landscape or collection of gardens (shukkei), the borrowed landscape (shakkei) and the dry landscape of contemplation (karesansui). 
Paraphrasing Villari “…the shukkei (from shuku reduce and kei landscape) is the technique of miniature representation of the landscape. This particular expression is typical of the gardens built during the 17th and 18th centuries; Katsura…”, which we learned about in the previous dissertation on the foreshortened vision of the subject, “…is a clear example of shukkei, a narrative text on the Japanese territory, a sort of metaphor for some of the most famous landscapes, an ideal place to make infinite pilgrimages. A garden created to be crossed, a kaiyu shiki teien, literally a walking garden…”.

The theme is that of the journey where the story, made up of many chapters, the different views and the numerous tea houses, is perceived thanks to the temporal unity of the visit. As in Katsura, also in many other historical Japanese gardens it is observed how “…the representation of easily identifiable archetypal landscapes, unconscious heritage of memory, facilitates the reading and interpretation of the natural landscape…” (Villari, 2003). Examples of this are the large sand cone of Ginkaku-ji which represents the profile of the famous Fuji-yama, the lakes of Kinkaku-ji or of Katsura itself, which recall seas dotted with islands, the rocks of Ryoan-ji or of the various sub-temples of Daitoku-ji, which evoke images of mythical or real mountains and, again, animals of Japanese tradition such as the crane, the turtle and the carp. 

Ginkaku-ji Sand Cone

Many examples of contemporary landscape design according to Villari “…present narrative texts, made of sequences, hierarchies and rhetorical figures. …the observer is invited to symbolically appropriate the repertoire of images, symbols and meanings to insert into the list of his own experiences”.
The carp, a typical animal of the many traditional Japanese lake gardens, is certainly the main theme that links Martha Schwart's work to Nexus Fukuoka International Housing. A large group of internationally renowned architects, coordinated by Arata Isozaki, took care of the redevelopment of a large neighborhood in the city of Fukuoka, in southern Japan, around the 1980s and 1990s.

A Martha Schwart was asked to study and create a connective tissue capable of uniting all the buildings and architectural structures put in place during the work. Schwart's winning idea was to reinterpret the shukkei in a modern key, narrating the passage of some carp through the various buildings. The resulting fluid dynamism marries well with the memory of the carp in historic Japanese gardens that, at the clap of the hands, flock towards the guest. Seen from the top of the buildings, the park takes on that microscale typical of the shukkei: from many dozens of meters high those large mounds of rock and grass recall in every way the carp in motion, the large bamboos and palms evoke the rushes of the lake and, as in a modern karesansui, the color of the paving recalls the great sea of ​​sand of Ginkaku-ji.

Umekoji Park in Kyoto

Another example of modern shukkei is theUmekoji Park in Kyoto, built around 2000, as a reminder of the history of Kyoto as the capital (main photo). A major international design competition saw many of the most important landscape architects of our time compete on the theme of reinterpreting the classical garden. Of all the ideas submitted, the winning one turned out to be the re-proposal of the shukkei reinterpreted through new proportions and thanks to the use of modern and technologically advanced materials.

Umekoji Park in Kyoto, as well as Katsura, is a series of landscapes, drawn from the uncontaminated nature of Japan. Water is the common thread that links the entire story: everything begins with the waterfall, then continues through the streams, the rivers with large bends and finally reaches the calm and placid sea full of ravines and peninsulas that jut out into its mirror. Only the rigidity of form of some modern elements and the use of technological materials such as aluminum and optical fiber allow us to understand that this is a contemporary work.

Paraphrasing Villari again, the technique of “…shakkei, literally the imprint of the landscape, consists in establishing a visible link between the garden space and the surrounding landscape. (…) Shakkei is not limited to a simple visual relationship with the horizon but, from time to time, uses the landscape as a material, with the same criteria with which stones, gravel, vegetation and water are used. Thus mountains, hills, woods, lakes, swamps, waterfalls and even architectural elements external to the garden, find the right place…”.

In the classical history of the Japanese garden, there are numerous works that have drawn, thanks to the shakkei technique, images and natural elements external to the property. Among these we remember the well-known gardens Murin-an, Etsu-ji, Koetsu-ji and Kogen-ji, which have “framed” the profiles of some mountains of Kyoto making them become compositional elements of the garden.

The contemporary garden of the Research Center for Japanese Garden Art of the Kyoto University of Art and Design, designed and built about ten years ago according to the most classic tradition of shakkei, is a clear example of how space can be expanded almost infinitely by emphasizing images and elements of the surrounding landscape (photo 9). In this case, it is once again one of the many mountains of Kyoto that becomes the protagonist of the garden. Photo 8 highlights how the design of the work drew not only from the traditional shakkei technique, but also from the classic method of organizing the foreshortened image.

Another example of contemporary shakkei is the Kyoto Station Plaza designed by Hiroshi Hara in 1994. In the early XNUMXs, Hara won the competition for the new construction of Kyoto Station, which also included, among others, Tadao Ando, ​​Kisho Kurokawa and James Stirling. Drawing from Villari's description, Hara's project is a "... infernal architectural machine, two large slats parallel to the tracks enclose a large hall, of enormous dimensions, determining a large void covered by a skylight two hundred meters long by about seventy meters high. (...) crossing the hall you are transported, with complex escalators, to the roof of the building where one of the most interesting places in the entire station is presented...".

It is a large hanging square that acts as a panoramic terrace over the entire city of Kyoto. Like large frames, the perimeter structures frame well-defined and expertly identified views of the city. As Villari himself admits, it seems that the landscape of the city of Kyoto is projected like a film on the boundary walls of the square, and that Hara's project is a modern shakkei in the city of the historical Japanese garden par excellence.
These are some examples of modern creations that have drawn from the classical tradition of the Japanese garden, extrapolating the true compositional meaning and aesthetic aspect of a culture that has always seen the discourse on the garden in the dialogue between nature and man.

Dr. Agr. Francesco Merlo
Master in Landscape and Green Area Design – University of Turin