Message from jchristensen

[Anonymous]

Another site to explore is The Virtual Museum of Japanese Arts sponsored by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is well organized and easy to maneuver. It is an introduction to the traditional arts of Japan that will interest students. Most of the information is presented with minimal text accompanying pictures, but there are several short videos included.

http://web-japan.org/museum/menu.html

The Architecture and Gardens section was most interesting after our visit to the Huntington Gardens in May. There are four gardens for viewing, including a temple garden from 1339 and a 17th century palace garden outside Kyoto.

The Todaiji Temple houses the central Buddha (completed in 752 CE) and several newer buildings are on the same grounds. The pictures offer a fine study of temple architecture.

The Performing Arts section provides beautiful pictures of sets and costumed actors in Kabuki, Noh and Bunraku Puppet Theater. Enlarging the picture brings out the masks' details and the composition of the sets.

Pastimes include flower arranging, calligraphy (which includes the First Works of Calligraphy of the New Year), the tea ceremony and bonsai (of special interest since our trip to the Huntington Gardens).

There are also interesting sctions on martial arts (judo, sumo, karate and aikido), Ninja, Tanka and Haiku, and four festivals of Japan.

If you have a Quick-Time player plug-in, you can watch movies of Japanese festivals and martial arts.

This accessible site offers a lot of information that students can get into quickly and easily. Assigning topics to groups of students and having them report out to the class will be easy and interesting.