the japonisme craze

in addition to japan's influence, on the deepest levels, on painting, design, architecture, music, literature, theater, dance, etc., something else happened: japonisme was cool, hip, what everyone was either into or parodied.

both high- and low-brow culture embraced the "new" aesthetic in numerous ways. on the first hand, as seen in the example in the previous entry, and here, many european and american painters began to work japanese items into their portraits. japanese prints and decorative screens adorned the backgrounds of paintings, women held fans, wore kimono, carried parasols. even when direct references were not made, thematically one might see lotus and other japanese symbols as motif.