HIROSHIGE AND VAN GOGH

HIROSHIGE AND VAN GOGH
Read About Van Gogh's Secret Visit to Japan

WELCOME TO BLOGABOUTJAPAN

WELCOME TO BLOGABOUTJAPAN
IT WAS A SPECIAL TIME IN MY LIFETIME

APT WITH TATAMI MATS, a special time in my lifetime in Japan...

APT WITH TATAMI MATS, a special time in my lifetime in Japan...
Watercolor by R.L.Huffstutter

COMPARISONS IN ART

COMPARISONS IN ART
HIROSHIGE'S WORK ON LEFT, VAN GOGH'S ON RIGHT

YOKOHAMA PICTURE SHOW

YOKOHAMA PICTURE SHOW
Shot with my Petri in Yokohama 1962

RICE FIELD IN JAPAN 1962

RICE FIELD IN JAPAN 1962
I took this with my PETRI in Kanagawa Prefecture

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

THE OLD IMPERIAL HOTEL in PRE-WW2 TOKYO -- Frank Lloyd Wright's Masterpiece in Japan

I STAYED HERE IN 1961: COST FOR A DECENT ROOM WAS ABOUT $10..................................HONEST. AND NOW IT IS GONE.
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Here we have T. ENAMI meeting up with the work of FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT. Wright's version of the Imperial Hotel, replacing those that came before it, opened on September 1st, 1923 -- the same fateful day on which the Great Kanto Plains Earthquake destroyed Enami's Photographic Studio -- along with most of Yokohama and Tokyo.

Thanks to Wright's modern building techniques that employed a large amount of steel girders and reinforcements, this hotel survived with only minor damage. Enami himself had rebuilt his studio on Benten Street and was back in business within two years.

After 45 years in service, the structure was finally razed in 1968 to make way for a new incarnation. Thankfully, conservation minded individuals assured that part of the Hotel was saved. Students of Wright's architectural works may continue to see and examine this original Entryway at Meiji Mura Architectural Park outside of Nagoya.

The new Imperial Hotel in Tokyo has also incorporated some pieces of Wright's embellishments as part of the public interior spaces --- at least I remember seeing some of it before passing out in the Bar after too many "Rum and Cokes".

For more on the long history of the place, and its many incarnations, see : www.imperialhotel.co.jp/cgi-bin/imperial_hp/index_e.cgi?a...

Frank Lloyd Wright was also a photographer, and a book of 50 of his photographs taken while in Japan has been published. (Try a used book connection thru amazon.com)

From a Lantern-slide by T. ENAMI of Yokohama. Ca.1923-28. For more on the Life and Times of Enami see : www.t-enami.org/


For the MOTHER LODE of T. Enami photographs here on the Web --- all CC rated for your creative use --- see this Flickr collection : www.flickr.com/photos/24443965@N08/collections/7215761388...


RANDOM SOBA : www.flickriver.com/photos/24443965@N08/random/

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