Tradition Transformed: Arts of the Meiji Era

Join us for a closing talk for our special exhibition Samurai to the Imperial Court with Joe Earle.

After the political earthquake of the Meiji Restoration (1867–68), Japanese metalworkers confronted a sudden collapse of samurai and Buddhist patronage, forcing a radical reinvention of liturgical craft and sword‑fitting traditions. At international exhibitions, Japan’s bronze casters quickly astonished Western audiences with works of remarkable technical brilliance, while former sword‑fitting specialists reimagined their alloys and engraving skills to produce pictorial compositions that offered foreign collectors an alluring blend of the familiar and the exotic. 

Government officials supported these master craftsmen with design expertise, commercial guidance, and Imperial backing. As a result, within scarcely a quarter century, Japanese metalworkers—together with innovators in cloisonné enameling—had created entirely new artistic styles, firmly rooted in native traditions yet boldly refashioned for global markets.

Placing earlier metalwork alongside masterpieces from the Samurai to the Imperial Court exhibition, Joe Earle will trace this remarkable process of transformation through the achievements of some of the era’s greatest Japanese artist‑entrepreneurs.

About the speaker:

Joe Earle is the Bonhams Global Senior Consultant for Japanese Art. He has worked in the East Asian art field for the last 50 years. Earle has held leadership positions in Asian art departments at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and was Director of Japan Society Gallery in New York from 2007 to 2012. He has organized more than two dozen exhibitions in Britain, Japan, Italy, and the United States and written, translated, or edited books and catalogues on aspects of Japanese culture ranging from contemporary art and design to samurai sword fittings, netsuke, bamboo art, flower-arrangement bronzes, lacquer, and the art of the Meiji era.