Japonisme 

Japonisme/Japonism is a french term that refers to the influence of Japanese art on Western art. In 1853/1854 Japan had re-opened their ports to trade with the western world. A tidal wave of foreign imports flooded Europe, the imports consisted of fans, porcelains, woodcuts, kimonos, lacquers, wood block prints, bronzes and silks. In 1862 the World Fair hosted in Europe brought even more attention to Japanese Art. In the 1860's Japanese wood block prints became very popular and were a source of inspiration to many impressionist and post-impressionist artists in the west such as Monet, Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. Western artists were fascinated by the Japaneses decorative arts because it offered a new freedom from imitative or photographic representation, and introduced new angles of vision and an entirely different treatment of perspective.  The aesthetics and characteristics that are noticeable in Japanese art are elongated pictorial formats, asymmetrical compositions, aerial perspective, spaces emptied of all but abstract elements of colour and line, a focus on singularly decorative motifs, cropped close-up partial views of objects in the foreground and the use of bold, unshaded colour. Quite a few well known western painters in that time show characteristics of Japanese art in their paintings such as Van Gogh, Toulouse Lautrec etc.  

An example of an artist that showed Japanese influences in his paintings is Henri Toulouse Lautrec. 

The dance hall named Moulin Rouge had made a competition and chose Henri Toulouse-Lautrec's poster design. The appearance of the poster Moulin Rouge: La Galoue on the Parisian streets made him famous over night and launched his artistic career. The poster above shows Japanese characteristics because of its bold colours and abstract lines and flatness.

VGG, 2013. Van Gogh Gallery. [Online] Available at <http://www.vangoghgallery.com/influences/japonisme.html>
[Accessed on 21st April 2013]

TBH, 2013. The British Museum. [Online] Available at <http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/articles/j/japonisme.aspx>
[Accessed on 21st April 2013]

TMMA, 2013. The metropolitan museum of art. [Online] Available at <http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/jpon/hd_jpon.htm>
[Accessed on 21st April 2013]

NGA, 2013. The national gallery of Australia. [Online] Available at <http://artsearch.nga.gov.au/Detail.cfm?IRN=200125>
[Accessed on 21st April 2013]