Amida

Hyōgo Daibutsu at Kobe F.S. Postcard

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The original Hyōgo Daibutsu at Nōfuku-ji was the third largest Buddhist statue in Japan. It was dismantled by the Ordinance on the Collection of Metals issued in 1941 as part of Japanese war efforts during WWII.

Located in the port city of Kobe, the Daibutsu was approximately 12 meters in height. It became a popular tourist destination at the end of the 19th century, thus many photographs and postcards remain of the now lost icon.

This “undivided back” design informs us the postcard was printed before 1907. The “F.S.” in the stamp box refers to the publisher’s name (which I haven’t identified).

Many Japanese postcards of this period were hand-colored collotype prints. You can see the red ink splotches the colorist used to suggest design elements.

An albumen print photograph by Kusakabe Kinbei is held by the Nagasaki University Library, viewable here: http://oldphoto.lb.nagasaki-u.ac.jp/zoom/jp/record.php?id=1044

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Marguerite Courtot c. 1920 Studio Portrait

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Silent film star Marguerite Courtot joined Pathé after WWI and became a centerpiece in the studio’s action-adventure serials. She starred in Pirate Gold (1920), Velvet Fingers(1920) and The Yellow Arm (1921), with the latter being a stereotypical “Yellow Menace” adventure.

This photo does not appear to be a production still (a movie set photo), but a studio portrait taken in New York City. The portrait dates to around 1920 when the silent film industry was still centered in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

Courtout grasps on to the Buddha statue using a dramatic stage gesture, a relic of the theater age that was adopted in early film. While The Yellow Arm serial is considered lost, it is possible this was a cast portrait used in promoting the film.

Short written synopses survive for several of the Yellow Arm episodes as copyright claims. The synopsis for episode one is held by the Library of Congress, viewable here: https://www.loc.gov/item/s1229l16612/.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Daibutsu and Tour Group Glass Lantern Slide

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In the pre-film era, magic lantern slides were a part of popular entertainment alongside panoramas and mechanical theaters. Many amateur lecturers who returned from a trip would book a church hall or town theater to show slides illustrating their personal travel narrative.

While photos and postcards were shared with friends in the home, glass lantern slides were also intended for showy public display. Consequently, glass slides were often hand-painted in eye-catching color; here we see the bronze Kamakura Daibutsu in uncharacteristic magenta.

Two pieces of glass, one of which bears the positive photographic print, sandwich the image to keep it safe from scratches and debris. Unlike the exemplar here, the publisher would often print their name on the matting around the image.

Based on the layout of the Daibutsu grounds, this photo was taken around 1910.

The University of Hawaii at Manoa has a large collection of slides as part of their Japan Collection, viewable here: https://tinyurl.com/8hdvfzad

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Hand-Colored Daibutsu Postcard Comparison

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The US postal service delivered over 900 million postcards on the eve of WWI. In Japan, that number was 1.5 billion. Despite nearly doubling the total number of cards mailed, many Japanese picture postcards were also rather unique – they were individually hand painted.

As far as we can tell, a template card was painted by a specialist before it was sent out with dozens of plain cards to colorists, many of whom were women. At times you can find more notable coloring discrepancies between paired images.

Note the differences in the boy’s garments, the open umbrella, the obi-sash, and stone pedestal in the background. It is also possible to see how the washes of color line up imperfectly with the collotype print in black ink.

Due to the temple landscaping around the Kamakura Daibutsu, we know this photograph was likely taken between 1903 and 1910. According to the postal mark, the stamp was cancelled on October 15, 1912 (Taisho 1) and mailed to the United States (thus requiring a 4 sen stamp). We also have a rare publisher’s mark along the edge: James Eades & Co., Yokohama, Japan.

The Kamakura Daibustu was among the most popular tourist destinations in Japan and countless images of the bronze statue were sent as postcards around the world in the early 20th century.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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American Express Daibutsu Advertisement

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After the opening of the Panama Canal and the end of WWI, the first around-the-world commercial cruise was chartered by the American Express Company in late 1922. The following summer of 1923, American Express began advertising for its next cruise using the Great Buddha of Kamakura.

The success of the inaugural cruise is celebrated in the advertising copy. It notes how the journey is “luxuriously comfortable, wholly delightful, and easily obtainable.” The brief itinerary lists the major ports to be visited, including a long 13 day stay in Japan.

The most conspicuous element is the large cropped photo of the “sacred idol of Japan” – the Kamakura Daibutsu. Notably, the photo depicts the inaugural cruise passengers positioned in front, looking directly at the camera lens.

Unfortunately, the Great Kantō earthquake struck in September 1923, damaging the Daibutsu. The Second American Express Cruise Round the World continued, however, leaving New York in November 1923 and returning in March 1924.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Baron Raimund von Stillfried’s Daibutsu Carte de visite

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Early Photographic Souvenirs: When Baron Raimund von Stillfried (1839–1911) opened his Yokohama studio in 1871, globe-trotting was becoming the rage among wealthy elite. This phenomenon was reflected in Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days, published in 1873.

A decade earlier, the small format carte-de-visite had emerged as one of the most popular products of commercial photography studios. Originally used as inexpensive family portraits carried in jacket pockets, they soon turned into common tourist souvenirs.

The 19th century globe-trotting circuit included port in Yokohama, the first landfall as you came west across the Pacific. Stillfried’s souvenir photo bears a handwritten note:
This is Diaboots
The Japanese God
what they worship
he is a big size

“Diaboots” refers to Daibutsu.

Stillfried became well known for his Japanese landscapes, a genre that was also popular among foreign globe-trotters.He would carefully frame Japanese people into his shots to underscore elements of foreignness.

Stillfried also published larger format prints bound into albums. An early exemplar from 1872, titled Views and Costumes of Japan, is held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, viewable here: https://tinyurl.com/yuuf52u9.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Jerome Camp Amida Shrine News Photograph

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Barbed-wire Buddhas: Buddhist objects were precious – and rare – at American Japanese internment camps during WWII. Here, issei Buddhist priest Rev. Gyōdō Kōno, stands in front of a small shrine to Amida Buddha at the Jerome relocation camp in Arkansas.


In February 1942, Executive Order 9066 was authorized, forcing the incarceration of more than 110,000 Americans of Japanese descent. Most were Buddhist. Japanese Buddhist temples on American soil were closed and only a few small religious items could be brought to the camps.


Often, items like shrines (butsudan), altar tables, and other ritual implements were made from scraps of wood with delicate care.


Buddhist rosaries (o-nenju), like the one held by Rev. Kōno, were important ritual items for the Jodo Shinshu sect.

After leaving the Jerome camp, Rev. Kōno relocated to Chicago and founded the Midwest Buddhist Temple which is still open today.

The Smithsonian National Museum of American History owns one of the internment camp Buddhist shrines from Jerome along with other items from the internment era. The shrine can be viewed here: https://tinyurl.com/yvb3heut

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Hamburg–American Cruise Postcard

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The first regular around-the-world commercial cruises began in the early 1920s. The Great Buddha of Kamakura was an iconic stop on the long sea passage; its international stature as a tourist destination was equivalent to the Taj Mahal and the Sphinx.

Within a decade, circumnavigation of the globe by passenger liner transformed into a stalwart luxury industry. The Hamburg–American Line was one of the main companies in the inter-war period.

Passengers kept family or friends abreast of their travels by having postcards automatically sent from ocean liner offices around the world. Here we see notification of the Resolute arriving in the ports of Japan on April 24, 1934. Tours through Nikko and Kamakura are noted.

The photograph printed here depicts a seemingly orchestrated scene that highlights the foreignness and apparent piousness of the Japanese.

The travel and souvenir journal of Eleanor Phelps, who embarked on the inaugural American Express Co. cruise around the world in 1922, is held by the University of South Carolina, viewable here: https://tinyurl.com/avt4xt2p.

Additional Archived Posts for the Buddhas in the West Project

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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