Uuntil the Meiji Restoration in 1868, Kyoto's Gosho Palace, a rectangular compound of approximately 110,000 sq. meters, housed Japan's Imperial Family for more than 1,000 years. The buildings have been destroyed by fire on a number of occasions, but were rebuilt each time exactly in the original ancient style.
One can only imagine the countless artistic treasures consumed by the flames -- the finest of each era -- and lament their loss.
When the most recent, still-extant building was being reconstructed in the 1850s, several eminent artists were commissioned to decorate the fusuma (sliding, paper and lacquered-wood framed doors) that would be placed throughout the palace. Sheltered for conservation reasons, they have almost never been seen publicly before. Now, for "Sliding Door Panels of the Kyoto Imperial Palace New Year Special Exhibition," which runs till Feb. 18 at the Kyoto National Museum, the Imperial Household Agency has loaned 212 painted paper door panels together with 10 cedar ones. Perfectly preserved, they present a time-warp view into late Edo Period Kyoto's artistic milieu and the court life that was just beginning to break out of a mold that had hardly changed in centuries.