Landscape Aesthetics on the Sacred Island “Miyajima” in Hiroshima : In Terms of the Sublime, Grace, and the Picturesque <Research Note>

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  • 聖なる島〈安芸ノ宮島〉の風景美学 : 崇高・優美・ピクチャレスクから <研究ノート>
  • Landscape Aesthetics on the Sacred Island "Miyajima" in Hiroshima : In Terms of the Sublime, Grace, and the Picturesque

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Abstract

The aesthetics of the “Aki-no-Miyajima (安芸ノ宮島)” landscape in Hiroshima constitute a form of scientific application of several western aesthetic categories to a specific Japanese site. Specially speaking, this study considers the adoption of 《the Sublime》, 《Grace》, and 《the Picturesque》, which were flourished and discussed in Europe (especially in Britain) around the 18th century, for one of the Best Three Views among Japan. Additionally the present paper also incorporates the analytic method of “die Alpen-ästhetik” from Georg Simmel’s Philosophische Kultur (1911). The Jewish-German philosopher divided the landscape of the Alps into the three aspects: grass-fields at the mountain-foot, rocky massif at the mountain-side, and perpetual snow at the heavenly peak. Now we will make full use of the three aesthetic categories and Simmel’s method, and examine to treat the rocky and rugged peak of Mt. “Misen (弥山)” in terms of 《the Sublime》, the floating “Itsukushimajinja (厳島神社)” shrine between land and sea (or heaven and earth, or gods and human beings) in terms of 《Grace》, and the entire landscape of the integrated parts: mountains, coastal lines, and shrines with the large red “Oh-torii (大鳥居)” gate in the sea in terms of《the Picturesque》. The paper may also illustrate the reason why the Miyajima landscape has ever been called one of the “Nippon-sankei (日本三景)”, The Best Three Views of Japan, defined by Shunsai HAYASHI (林春斎), a Confucian scholar at the early Edo period. And finally we will find it here a contest of the various sorts of the beauty, or their secret co-existence.

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