June 2003

Martin St-Pierre

Nishimura Isaku was one of Japan?s most significant post-Meiji restoration renaissance men. Born in September 1884 in Shingu city to devout protestant parents, Isaku was named after Abraham?s son Isaac. His other brothers, Shichibun (Stephen) and Mako (Marc) were similarly named after important Christian figures and religion would play an important role, along with other factors, in the molding of this young man?s psyche at a time when Japan and its people were experiencing significant changes. Shingu was, at the time, the most important port and business center in the Kii peninsula. The Kumano River was used for floating logs down to the port of Shingu, where they were loaded onto ships bound for Japan?s developing urban centers. Because of the Kuroshio Current, it was also an important stop for ships traveling between Tokyo, Osaka and Kobe. Shingu was therefore a prosperous city and one of the centers from which rich and influential landowners in Wakayama would conduct their business.

The great Noubi earthquake of 1891 killed both his parents and the 7-year-old Isaku narrowly escaped from the collapsing family home. This earthquake killed a total of 7,273 people and destroyed about 14,000 dwellings.
For more information on this disaster (in Japanese):
http://research.kahaku.go.jp/rikou/namazu/04nobi/noubi.html

He was adopted into the Nishimura family, which was his mother?s maiden name. The family owned extensive property in Nara and Isaku became the sole inheritor of the family estate. His grandmother and his uncle Oishi Seinosuke, who was the single most significant person in his life, brought up Isaku. Seinosuke and his sister were the first baptized as Christians (circa 1881 ? 1882) in Shingu by the first American missionary in Wakayama: Alexander Durham Hail. A.D. Hail and Oishi Seinosuke, who had studied medicine at the University of Oregon, were both physicians. This meant that young Isaku was therefore influenced by Western culture at a time when there were only 3 foreigners living in Wakayama prefecture. Seinosuke?s travels to America and India also helped shape Isaku?s taste for Western thought and art, but architecture became his passion.

At the turn of the century, he went into self-exile to Singapore because he refused to take part in the war between Russia and Japan. At the time, Japan had adopted the Prussian military style and this meant that all young men were conscripted into the army.

Virtually nothing is known of his stay in Singapore but upon his return after the war, he continued, mostly through self-study, to deepen his understanding of Western photography, oil painting, cooking, pottery, philosophy and architecture.

He also went to America to study and research American architecture. In 1906, his brother Shichibun who was studying architecture in Massachusetts became ill and Isaku went over to help his younger brother. The year before, his other brother Mako had gone on trip to the San Francisco area. Trans-Pacific traveling was quite rare and costly at the time, however Isaku, as the family heir, had the means to do make these opportunities possible for he and his brothers.

In 1921, he established offices for the Nishimura Architects Company in Kobe and Tokyo. He designed and helped to build homes, churches, schools and offices in the Western style. He was one of the first Japanese to adopt the Western concept of the living room as being central to a dwelling. This, he took from the writings of the famous A.J. Downing, who helped shape the concept of the turn of the century American bungalow. This type of dwelling, which was most accessible to all Americans through Sears Roebuck and other similar catalogues, was popular, cheap and easy to build.

He also opened and funded a co-ed school in 1921 in the Surugadai area of Tokyo, called Bunka Gakuin, where he and his wife, Mitsue, taught liberalism. Isaku?s nine children also attended the school, which was an extension of the home education he gave them before opening this institution. There, he espoused a freethinking educational concept that was revolutionary in Japan. Central to his philosophy was the concept of openness. Classes were not restricted to a single room. Students would often be outdoors, learning about their environment, dance, arts, and culture. He would even teach sex education and went so far as to publish several books and articles about his liberalistic beliefs.

Sadly, liberalism was not accepted in the years leading up to the Second World War and the school could only reopen after the war.
This was not the only time Isaku experienced state oppression. In late 1910, Isaku and his younger brother Mako rode to Tokyo from Shingu on a new Thor motorcycle in order to support their uncle Oishi Seinosuke who had been arrested for treason against the state. He was executed the next year for allegedly being complicit in the murder of Shusui Kotoku, a high-ranking official.
Isaku died in 1963 after a long life dedicated to opening his country and its people to other possibilities. His first home, built in 1914, is now the Nishimura Memorial Museum. The Wakayama Museum of Modern Art in Wakayama City now houses several of his works.

Posted on June 2003 in the following categories: People | TrackBack(315)