With the Japanese, landscape gardening is one of the fine arts. Ever since the middle of the fifteenth century it has been elaborated and refined until it has come to be considered a mystery, as well as an art, possessing a vocabulary more complicated and recondite than would be thought possible.
Gardens are supposed to symbolise abstract ideas, such as peace, chastity, old age, etc. They are invariably picturesque and attractive, but theatrical in effect, the hand of the gardener being everywhere apparent
Source: JAPAN. Described and Illustrated by the Japanese. Written by Eminent Japanese Authorities and Scholars. Edited by Captain F Brinkley (1841 – 1912) of Tokyo Japan. With an Essay on Japanese Art by Kakuzo Okakura (1860 – 1929) Director of the Imperial Art School at Tokyo Japan. 1897.
