Heian Japan meant level of sensitivity or sadness, and the word mono, meaning things, and describes beauty as an awareness of the transience of all ordinary things, and a gentle sadness at their passing. It may also be translated as the “ah-ness” of things, of life, and love. According to mono no aware, a wilting or dropping autumn rose is more beautiful than one completely bloom; a fading sound more beautiful than one clearly heard; the moon clouded more appealing than full partly.
The sauna or cherry blossom tree is the epitome of this conception of beauty; the blooms of the most famous variety, somei yoshino, nearly genuine white tinged with a simple pale red, bloom, and then fall within an individual week. The subject of a thousand poems and a national icon, the cherry blossom tree embodies beauty as a transient experience.
Mono no aware state governments that beauty is a subjective rather than objective experience, a state of being internal rather than external ultimately. Based on classical Greek ideals largely, beauty in the West is sought in the best perfection of an external object: a sublime painting, perfect sculpture, or intricate musical composition; a beauty that could be said to be only skin deep.
The Japanese ideal views beauty instead as an experience of the core, a sense for and understanding of objects or artwork–most commonly character or the depiction of–in a pristine, untouched condition. Here we are reminded of what his religious daughter Nivedita had written about her Master. Truly, in the lack of appreciation, beauty is not beauty whatsoever. Motoori Norinaga (1730-1801), was the pre-eminent scholar of the Kokugakushu movement, a nationalist motion which sought to remove all outside affects from Japanese culture.
Kokugakushu was enormously influential in artwork, poetry, philosophy, and music, and responsible for the revival through the Tokugawa period of the Shinto religious beliefs. Contradictorily, the impact of Buddhist ideas and practices upon artwork and Shintoism itself was so great that even, although Buddhism is an outside impact technically, it was by this point unable to be extricated.
According to mono no aware, falling, or wilting fall months rose is more beautiful than one in full bloom; a fading sound more beautiful than one clearly noticed; the moon partially clouded more desirable than full. The sauna or cherry blossom tree is the epitome of the conception of beauty; the blooms of the very most famous variety, somei yoshino, almost genuine white tinged with a simple pale pink, bloom, and then fall within a single week.
The subject matter of one thousand poems and a national icon, the cherry blossom tree embodies beauty as a transient experience. Mono no aware states that beauty is a subjective than an objective experience rather, a state of being ultimately internal rather than exterior. Based mainly upon classical Greek ideals beauty in the West is searched for in the best perfection of an external object: a sublime painting, perfect sculpture, or elaborate musical structure; a beauty that could be said to be only skin deep.