Showa period (1926-1989)
Japanese lost so much art works including Maki-e during WWII, including innumerable Maki-e pens, while less and less Japanese are interested in Maki-e, there were many people who are concerned about the survival of the art trying to work together with the government. Tokyo Art School now is Tokyo Art University and already brought up many great artists since it was established. One significant step for this direction was the start of “Nihon Dento Kogeiten”, The Japanese Traditional Art & Craft Exhibition in 1954 mainly organized by the member of National Treasures in order to preserve and promote the arts. Since then, their activity has been extended to many different groups divided into two big worlds, “the art for art’s sake” and “the arts as crafts”.

Today there are more than 100 major art exhibitions in Japan, individual artist’ exhibitions are held at Major department stores in larger cities all over the country.

The Urushi/Maki-e related “National Treasures” until now are:
Takano Shozan (1889-1976) - Maki-e in 1955
Matsuda Gonroku (1896-1986) - Maki-e in 1955
Otomaru Kodo (1898-1997) - *Choshitsu in 1955
Mae Taiho (1890-1977) - **Chinkin in 1955
Isoi Joshin (1883-1964) - ***Kinma in 1956
Akai Yusai (1906-1984) - ****Kyushitsu in 1974
Masumura Mashiki (1910-1996) - Kyushitsu in 1978
Oba Shogyo (1916- ) - Maki-e in 1982
Terai Naoji (1912-1998) - Maki-e in 1985
Isoi Masami (1926- ) - Kinma in 1985
Taguchi Yoshikuni (1924-1998) - Maki-e in 1989
Shioda Keishiro (1926- ) - Kyushitsu in 1995
Kitamura Shosai (1938- ) - *****Raden in 1999
Mae Fumio (1940- ) - Chinkin in 1999

*Chositsu: Paint with Urushi many layers and carve it to show the designs.
** Chinkin: Instead of drawing lines to design, carving on the Urushi surface and filling the carved lines with sticky Urushi and gold foils.
***Kinma: Use different color Urushi to draw by carving on Urushi surface to make the designs.
****Kyushitsu: The whole process from base Urushhi paintings to complete with final coatings.

Takano Shozan was competing with Matsuda Gonroku at Tokyo Art School when they were young, and both left tremendous art treasures to their followers later. The most famous student of Matsuda Gonroku is a National Treasure, Oba Shogyo, whose Maki-e is probably the most valuable in the community today, worth more than US$135,000 per square foot by size. Other famous followers of Matsuda Gonroku includes Terai Naoji, Taguchi Yoshikuni, and younger generations of Sasaki Ei (1934-1984), Kazumi Murose (1950- ),etc.

Heisei (1989- )
So Maki-e was born in the age of Nara, called Makkinru as the origin of Togidashi Maki-e, in the age of Heian, Raden, Ikakeji were brought as additional techniques of Maki-e, while Hira Maki-e was also created. In Kamakura period, Taka Maki-e was created, and Maki-e began to have dimensional effect. The Maki-e designs became much more colorful, and Shishiai Togidashi Maki-e was adopted and new techniques of powders sprinkling also became popular for designs. Japanese started business with foreign countries and Maki-e was exported through missionary groups. Then, Emperor Meiji encouraged people to exhibit at Expo in Europe and Maki-e works were widely welcome by the westerners. Maki-e were done on many different kinds of objects and preserved by many major museums in Europe and America. The Japanese government is trying hard to promote all arts by holding large scales of exhibitions to encourage artists to show their works to the public, but the numbers of Maki-e artists are actually dwindling to just a few hundreds nationwide in Japan today from 20,000 at its heydays in Edo period. Since the demand for restoration works on Maki-e by museums is so high that the government helps training many Maki-e shi in this field to meet the demand. Today’s qualities of materials for Maki-e are much higher than before and the technology also helps the Maki-e artists in many ways, yet the art is still too hard to attract young men and a bright idea is needed to keep the art survive well.

Bernard Lyn