Arts & Ideas Folgen

Frogs, farting competitions, art connoisseurs, courtesans and crows all feature in the art of Kawanabe Kyōsai,- a key Japanese figure who challenged traditions of Japanese art. Kyōsai blurred the lines between popular and elite forms and we take a look at a new exhibition of his work at the Royal Academy. In today’s Free Thinking, Chris Harding looks at both his art and the writing of Yukio Mishima. Mishima was one of Japan's most infamous writers when he died in 1970, writing both for the mass market novels and readers of high literature, fusing traditional Japanese and modern Western styles. In his final years he became increasingly interested in extreme politics, a call for the restoration of the Emperor to his pre-war power and culminated in his death by seppuku, the Samurai’s ritual suicide. With a new translation of Beautiful Star, we learn about him and the recent reappraisal of his work.Israel Goldman is a leading collector and dealer in the field of Japanese prints, paintings and illustrated books. The exhibition, Kyōsai: The Israel Goldman Collection, is at the Royal Academy from 19th March to 19th June 2022.Koto Sadamura specialises in Japanese art history of the late nineteenth century, with a particular focus on the painter Kawanabe Kyōsai.Stephen Dodd is Professor Emeritus of Japanese Literature at SOAS, University of London. He has written widely on modern Japanese literature and translated two novels by Yukio Mishima, including a new version of Beautiful Star published in April 2022.Kate Taylor-Jones is Professor of East Asian Cinema at the University of Sheffield.Producer: Ruth Watts

Xangô (the god of thunder) and Paso Ñañigo’, composed by the Cuban Moises Simons, were two of the numbers performed by Elsie Houston in the clubs of Paris in the 1920s. Also able to sing soprano in Portuguese, English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian, Elsie's performances in Afro-Brazilian dialects chimed with the fashion for all things African. Adjoa Osei's essay traces Elsie's connections with Surrealist artists and writers, (there are photos of her taken by Man Ray), and looks at how she used her mixed race heritage to navigate her way through society and speak out for African inspired arts.Adjoa Osei is a researcher based at Trinity College, Cambridge. She was selected as a 2021 New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn research into radio. Producer: Ruth Watts

An 1856 portrait shows a 40 year old man from Benin who managed to secure his freedom after being captured. Dasalu was taken from Dahomey to Cuba, alongside over five hundred adults and children in the ship Grey Eagle. Once in Havana, he worked for the Count of Fernandina but managed to get a letter to a missionary Charles Gollmer back in Africa. Jake Subryan Richard's essay traces the way one man’s migrations reveal the shifting boundaries of slavery and freedom.Jake Subryan Richards teaches at the London School of Economics and was chosen as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Council which turns research into radio. Producer: Ruth Watts