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We
live in the latter stages of the Age of Heroic Materialism. That's the name
given to this period by Kenneth Clarke, in the classic BBC documentary Civilisation. How do I
know that we are in the latter stages? Because we don't really believe in it
anymore. Nobody gets a hard-on from an enormous suspension bridge the way
they used to. Been
there. Done that.
This
is a Heroic Materialists' idea of a good time.
Whoop
de doo. That's great -- for a stiff case of road rage.
Driving
on the moon!
This
must have been the absolute high-water mark for Heroic Materialism. It's been
downhill ever since.
Ummm
... are there any girls on the moon?
I
recommend Clarke's entire documentary, which you can get on Netflix. It gives
you an idea of the entirety of Western civilisation, not just the present
period. People weren't always into Heroic Materialism.
The
18th century (just preceding the Industrial Revolution in the 1780s) was
known as an age of aesthetic sophistication. The focus then was making life
more artistic and subtle, rather than expressing our ability to manipulate
unprecedented volumes of steel and concrete.
Jean
Honore Fragonard, The
Swing, 1766.
Isn't
that a delightful image? Of course -- that was their goal. To make their
lives full of delight.
It is a popular image for Western Civ classes to express the character of the
18th century.
I
think it is important for Americans to understand at least a bit of Western
Civ -- our European heritage. Apparently they aren't teaching it in college
anymore.
It's
important because our American experience is much different. Heroic
Materialism began along with the Industrial Revolution, around 1780.
Europeans can look back at 2500 years of civilization before that time.
However, we Americans have nothing before 1780. There were the Native
Americans, who were admirable for many things, but we aren't going to live in
wigwams and hunt for buffalo with pointy sticks. In the American imagination,
there is Heroic Materialism or ... nothing. Annihilation. Total collapse. Or
a "return to nature" if you want to put it in those terms. I think
that's why, when Americans look for an alternative to the industrial world,
they tend to "go back to nature," which has a strangely colonial-era feel
about it. They gravitate toward log cabins and self-sufficient farms, and
making your own clothes out of buckskin. It's all very primitive.
However,
the image above isn't primitive at all. It is very sophisticated. You could
find similar examples of this focus on delight and aesthetic sophistication
in other cultures. For example, Japanese people had the "tea
ceremony." Most Westerners probably assume that the "tea
ceremony" was some sort of religious ceremony, like the way Catholics
drink wine and eat wafers in church. Not at all. The "tea ceremony"
was just a super-fancy way of drinking tea. It was a nexus point that
combined their various art forms into one coherent whole: tea, cuisine,
clothing, pottery, architecture, garden desgin, poetry, calligraphy, pictoral
art, and thrilling conversation. All taken to unprecedented levels. You could
have a brief cup of tea. Or you could have an extended event that could last
up to four hours, and would involve a full-course kaiseki meal followed by confections.
Tea is
nought but this;
First you heat the water,
Then you make the tea.
Then you drink it properly.
That is all you need to know.
- Sen
Rikyu (1552 - 1591)
Who
was Sen Rikyu?
Sen
Rikyu ... is considered the historical figure with the most profound
influence on chanoyu, the Japanese "Way of Tea", particularly the
tradition of wabi-cha. ...
There
are three iemoto,
or "head houses" of the Japanese Way of Tea, that are directly
descended from Rikyu: the Urasenke, the Omotesenke, and the Mushako-jisenke,
all three of which are dedicated to passing forward the teachings of their
mutual family founder, Rikyu.
Wikipedia on
Sen Rikyu
Of
course, a "tea ceremony" with food and wine isn't really about tea
anymore. It's just a whooped-up dinner party. Let's try it.
"Let's have
some tea."
"I'm
hungry!"
Kaiseki is
one of the most ambitious forms of Japanese cooking. It is practically
unheard-of in the United States. The theme for kaiseki is many, many small dishes,
served on a profusion of top-class art pottery. The idea is to have many
flavors of food, and also "flavors" of pottery. I have been to kaiseki dinners where
I have personally used over sixty pieces of pottery. (The dishwashing gets
pretty serious.) You can't put all those plates on the table at once, so it
is served in wave after wave of tiny delights (in the most ambitious forms).
This
kaiseki is from Singapore, which is why you have the "reverse roll"
which you never see in Japan.
You
can eat this in about eight seconds. But, it is better if you take your time.
This
light lunch has twelve dishes, plus tray, chopsticks and chopstick stand.
Add tea, sake and dessert, and you can easily blow through another dozen
plates.
These
photos are from restaurants, so they don't really have top-quality one-off
art pottery. Unfortunately, photos of top-class pottery with food are tough
to find, so you'll have to extrapolate from these photos of pottery without
food.
OK, I
know you guys can look at pictures of food for only so long ...
"I
can't sit like this forever. How about some sake?"
 
Bowls.
Plates.
A
plate in the Arita (Imari) style. This is actually a hybrid: the Arita style
began in the 17th century in imitation of Chinese designs, but was then
tweaked for European tastes in the 18th century, when much was exported via
the Dutch East India Company.
A
top-class Imari plate from the 1700-1740 period, now held at the Topkapi
Palace, Istanbul.
Flask
and cup for wine (sake).
These
"rough" styles of pottery particularly appeal to people today.
Lacquerware.
You
can see that the level of artistry is much higher here than the
restaurant-grade material.
"Do
you think those guys are done talking about currencies yet?"
"I
think they're talking about street width now."
"This
is the most boring party ever."
"You
better not make me eat off those plates you got from Ikea.
If you
do, its jeans and sweatshirts from here on out Bucko."
Houses
and other buildings serve all sorts of functions. Sometimes you have to make
compromises with practicality. The purpose of the teahouse, however, was
purely for pleasure. It was their "formal dining room." Normally,
it was accompanied by an exquisite garden.
Teahouse.
This
teahouse has a rock garden.
Garden
seen from teahouse, Kyoto.
Teahouse in a
wood.
The
famous Kinkakuji teahouse in Kyoto, built in 1397.
You
can't get any more gaudy than this!
At the
time, it was like having a gold-plated Porsche 911 Turbo.
They
were very
into tea in those days.
In 600
years, maybe people will think this is the greatest existing representation
of the Car Ceremony.
"If
your teahouse sucks ... forget it."
"You
aren't gonna get there by making more parking lots and Green Space."
(Actress
Yu Aoi in the drama "OSen." Good drama, by the way. We watched it
earlier this year.)
This
isn't really a teahouse style, it's a country farmhouse style. But who cares,
really.
Country
farmers also lived very well.
For
some reason, Japanese interiors have a reputation for "minimalism."
It's baloney.
"Japanese
minimalism" is mostly an invention of New Yorkers.
They
weren't gaudy, though. They were much too sophisticated for that (most of the
time).
"Now
the Americans are bombing
the moon? I can't wait until those guys collapse."
"Why
don't you carry me upstairs hmmm?"
Often,
there was music and elements of visual art.
On
balance, I'd say the Europeans had more sophisticated music and visual arts.
But, it's not a competition. Variety is fun.
"You have a
swing?"
Teahouse,
1880s, Hakone area west of Tokyo.
Unfortunately,
it is hard to find a photo that has all the elements together:
A
beautiful woman in spectacular clothes, eating stunning food from top-class
pottery, in a gorgeous building in a lush garden, enjoying music while
looking upon ink drawings on gilded screens. With tea, of course.
You'll
just have to imagine it. Even Japanese people, although they are much more
aesthetically sophisticated than Americans, come nowhere close today to the
heights they reached in the past. Modernity has been tough on everyone.
The
point is not that you really have to enjoy what was considered the pinnacle
of sophistication in 15th century Japan. In fact, you would probably find it
rather weird, and not necessarily enjoyable at all. Personally, I prefer jazz
to that plinky-plinky music, and I don't go for the traditional paste-white
makeup at all. The point is that they
were having a helluva time with it.
In the
same fashion, we could focus our attention on artifying our lives, and come
up with something completely new and utterly fabulous, instead of just making
our televisions bigger and bigger and bigger.
Sometime
soon (I can never finish these things in one go), we'll have a look at the
18th-century French version of high living.
They
had so much fun in those days.
Nathan
Lewis
Nathan
Lewis was formerly the chief international economist of a leading economic
forecasting firm. He now works in asset management. Lewis has written for the
Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal Asia, the Japan Times, Pravda, and
other publications. He has appeared on financial television in the United
States, Japan, and the Middle East. About the Book: Gold: The Once and Future
Money (Wiley, 2007, ISBN: 978-0-470-04766-8, $27.95) is available at
bookstores nationwide, from all major online booksellers, and direct from the
publisher at www.wileyfinance.com or 800-225-5945. In Canada, call
800-567-4797.
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