Cutting both ways - life-filled art and death-filled swords

click image for full-size view: one of the old katana blades on display 11/2018

The fall 2018 special exhibit at the National Museum of Kyoto, Japan features more than 100 historical Japanese swords, in conjunction with another exhibit that gathers characters from graphic novels (manga) who carry similar weapons.

The crowds on Saturday, November 3 (Culture Day) were considerable and for safety reasons were only admitted in groups of 12 every 5 or 10 minutes to keep pace with the circuit starting on the 3rd floor and wending down to the ground floor. The museum-ification takes the fearful instruments out of their historical context, being worn by samurai with the authority in defined situations to strike down lower status people and also being treated as treasured wealth or status among the samurai, not to mention the occasional application in a field of battle or for use in ritualized self-embowelment. So the glass cases with beams of spot lighting in the dim gallery, the absence of owner, scabbard, and grip all contributed to the hyper-aestheticized experience of viewing the swordsmiths' work up close.

collaborative to the fall special exhibition of swords (from Kyoto smithies, especially): manga characters toting katana

Reflecting on the artifacts from the point of view of social analysis or commentary, though, these weapons - despite the aesthetic attributes - were ultimately a tool for killing, much like handguns are today. Theoretically they can be used for something other than destroying human life, but that remains the primary application. And yet in the gallery setting, the horror they may have caused, the coercion they may have emanated, or the high-stakes encounters between pairs or groups of armed combatants is all erased. Instead there is the wonder of process and craftsmanship. There is a similar feeling when visiting the permanent exhibit of swords and guns arranged chronologically at the USA's National Museum of the American Indian in order to impress visitors with one of the fatal technologies that mediated the relationships between Native Peoples north and south of the equator and the aliens from across the Atlantic. Here, too, the wavy glass wall that mounts the many artifacts of hundreds of craftsmen, sellers - buyers - traders - scavengers, and collectors presents an aesthetic sensory experience rather than an indictment or set of case histories that record each weapon's curriculum vita, for example.

From a high altitude viewpoint, it is fair to say that economic surplus (usually thanks to the domesticated grains of settled agricultural society) and the technology of death (removing anybody who interferes with the smooth harvest of taxes extracted by high-status power holders), such as the sword makers and users on display here, is what made possible the concentrated cultural centers of learning, wealth accumulation, and technical advances in social organization/management and in drawing more resources from the Earth and its living and unliving things. And so, beyond the historical interest, the march forward in technical improvements of carbon steel, and the artistic curve of killing blades, this collection of regional swordsmithing is an essential part of the Japanese society that grew during the past 1,000 years on the islands.