In Japanese art, paintings of cherry trees and maple trees are often interpreted as depicting Yoshino and Tatsuta, places long famous for their scenery. Similarly, a scene with the moon setting over a plain covered in silver grass is understood as Musashino, and the combination of a bridge over a river, a willow tree, and a waterwheel signifies Uji. To eyes accustomed to photographs and realistic landscape paintings, these symbolic depictions of a specific place may seem puzzling. Japan’s famous places, however, have a long tradition of being expressed through poetic images in waka verse, rather than representations of the actual scene. The source of those images is known as the utamakura.

The utamakura, literally “poem pillow,” is the pillow, the platform, on which a poem rests. Specifically, this poetic trope is a place or place name associated with a particular image cultivated throughout the long history of waka, Japanese poetry. As in any art form, basic conventions were followed to express the world of those utamakura images. In this section, we experience the world of utamakura through the large pictorial spaces of folding-screen paintings.

In the distant past, utamakura referred to all words used in waka; place names were only one type. As those place names were repeatedly included in poems, however, specific images came to be attached to them, and they developed into poetic tropes, words of shared significance, and became a technique for expressing the poet’s feelings. By the late Heian period (794–1185), utamakura had acquired the more restricted meaning of “a place name to which a specific image is connected, in waka.”

Despite their association with place names, utamakura were more strongly connected to the emotional or spiritual landscapes shared among poets than to actual scenic spots. They became imagined famous places existing only in waka. Critical sources for utamakura were the Kokin Wakashū Poetry Anthology and other imperial anthologies. Because the imperial anthologies were official collections of waka, compiled at the order of the emperor, their prestige and the familiarity of the poems in the collections meant that the places included in those poems becoming particularly important utamakura.

This section presents an overview of the history of utamakura and the process by which they were formed, through calligraphy from the Heian period.

Utamakura were originally poetic tropes, place names employed in composing waka poetry, but they swiftly developed a deep relationship with the visual arts. It is worthy of note that the history of Japanese paintings of famous places began with Yamato-e depictions of utamakura in the Heian period (794–1185).

During the tenth century, in the mid Heian period, “folding screen poetry,” waka poems composed about folding-screen paintings, became a popular genre, and waka emerged about folding screens paintings of famous places. No examples of folding screens from that period are extant, but it appears that they were adorned not with realistic landscape paintings but paintings of seasonal scenery studded with images from the world of utamakura. Those viewing those folding screens would take pleasure in adding depth to the content of the paintings through the waka they composed for them and by imagining a host of stories underlying the screen paintings.

Folding screen poetry went out of fashion in the eleventh century, but even as times changed, poets, painters, and admirers of both continued to be conscious, in some form, of the relationship between utamakura and paintings, expressed by scenery that symbolized a certain place. This section focuses on utamakura visualized, rooted in that tradition of paintings of famous places.

Utamakura made it possible to feel that one had been to a famous place, without even stepping outside, thanks to the image of the place and the knowledge of it that the utamakura communicates. It thus become possible to compose waka poems about a place without actually having seen it. That connection to place, however, also intensified yearnings to experience the actual landscape, and people thus made utamakura journeys to visit those sites. Among them was Saigyō Hōshi (1118–90), a poet and Buddhist priest, whose long poetic journeys had an immense influence on later generations of poets, who often attempted to experience them actually or vicariously. The Narrow Road to the Deep North, by the famous poet Matsuo Bashō (1644–94), is regarded as one of those poetic journeys to utamakura in memory of Saigyō.

Not everyone, of course, could set out on an actual journey. To those for whom travel was difficult, utamakura made it possible to experience an imagined journey. Through ukiyo-e transposing the world of utamakura images and the manners and customs of the Edo period or gardens modeled on utamakura scenes, for example, it was possible to enjoy a journey, “to feel that one had been to a famous place, without even stepping outside.” In this section, we explore the inextricable relationship between travel and utamakura as the motive behind journeys taken by Japanese.

Throughout their history, utamakura have expressed images that symbolize a place, rather than its actual scenery. Their richly allusive, symbolic nature facilitates turning them into stylized motifs, now embedded in the designs of containers, vessels, and other functional objects. Among them, utamakura-inspired designs attained a strikingly sophisticated level in the writing box, which, through the act of writing, has a strong relationship with waka. Many superb writing boxes with utamakura-derived designs have been handed down to us. From tools and devices such as furniture, ceramics, and tea utensils to the textiles that clothed people’s bodies, utamakura designs adorned every aspect of life. In those artifacts one glimpses a world that brimmed with utamakura in daily life. Those designs are far from unfamiliar, for they can be seen on many objects used today.

Through the cornucopia of craft objects with designs based on utamakura displayed in this section, we can gain a sense of how the images associated with those poetic tropes were a living part of daily lives. Moreover, through them, we attempt to share the world of utamakura today, in a world in which the waka poems that nurtured them are no longer familiar parts of life.