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Picks is a monthly sampling of Japan's art scene, offering commentary by a variety of reviewers about exhibitions at museums and galleries in recent weeks, with an emphasis on contemporary art by young artists. |
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15 January 2015 |
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| Sayo Nagase: Follow Up |
| 11 - 12 November 2014 |
AL
(Tokyo) |
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| Hyogo-born Nagase's work appears mainly in fashion magazines, but once in a while she surprises us with a photo exhibit of pleasingly idiosyncratic taste. Her forte is a light touch with the shutter that instantly gives form to whatever image strikes her fancy. |
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| Kawori Inbe: Blue Facing the Beginning |
| 29 October - 10 November 2014 |
America-Bashi Gallery (ABG)
(Tokyo) |
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| Inbe's photographs provide no clues about the backgrounds of her subjects, women engaged here in some sort of performance. Every picture clearly tells a story, but it would be edifying to know a little more about just what each woman's story is. |
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| Atsushi Okada: Mother |
| 8 - 30 November 2014 |
B Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| In this 2008 series, Okada faithfully documents the spectacle of childbirth by one mother -- a rare opportunity to view close-up the process by which an infant passes through the birth canal and into the world. Raw images of the tiny newborn, awash in blood and amniotic fluid as it utters its first cries, surely offer a learning moment for young viewers. |
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| Masterpieces of Kosan-ji Temple |
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7 October - 24 November 2014 |
Kyoto National Museum
(Kyoto) |
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| With extensive conservation work completed in the spring of 2013, the legendary Choju-jinbutsu-giga ("Scrolls of Frolicking Animals and Humans"), a four-scroll National Treasure, took center stage here along with other cultural properties in the possession of Kyoto's Kosan-ji temple. One of the latter was the Yume no ki (Dream Diary), written over a period of 40 years by the temple's founder, the Kamakura-era priest Myoe Shonin. |
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| Shintaro Sato: The Spirit of the Place / Night Lights |
| 31 October - 15 December / 7 November - 20 December 2014 |
Canon Gallery S / Photo Gallery International
(Tokyo) |
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| Sato celebrated the reprinting of his debut photo collection Night Lights (1998) with two concurrent solo shows. The Spirit of the Place included his series "Fire-Escape Tokyo - Tokyo Twilight Zone" and "Tokyo: Sky Tree Risen in the East." Sato is a master at capturing scenes that define Japan's capital city. |
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| Paintings by Four |
| 14 - 20 November 2014 |
Zeit Foto Salon
(Tokyo) |
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| For its second show since relocating from Nihonbashi to the Ginza district, Zeit Foto Salon exhibited paintings by four female artists: Toeko Tatsuno, Kae Higuchi, Ikumi Nagasawa, and Mari Ito. This being a photo gallery, the reviewer figured the works would be photorealistic, photo-collages, or otherwise camera-inspired, but in fact they turned out to be an assemblage of very painterly paintings. |
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Images of Memory / Memories of Image |
15 - 30 November 2014 |
BankART Studio NYK
(Kanagawa) |
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| This group show by 17 artists receiving support from the Yoshino Gypsum Art Foundation was a variegated offering of paintings, sculptures, videos and installations. Noteworthy contributors included Futo Akiyoshi, Sohei Iwata, Kei Takemura, Sai Hashizume, and Kaeko Mizukoshi. |
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| Power of Media under the War |
| 10 October - 24 November 2014 |
Kawasaki City Museum
(Kanagawa) |
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| The year 2014 marked the 120th anniversary of the First Sino-Japanese War, the 110th anniversary of the Russo-Japanese War, and the centenary of the outbreak of World War I; this year is the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. All one can say is, there sure were a lot of wars back then. This exhibition serves a valuable historical purpose in bringing together newspapers, magazines, posters, photos, and other print media generated in the course of the first two of those conflicts. |
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| The Works of Saburo Miyamoto 1940s - 1950s: Military Experiences and Postwar Revival |
| 9 August - 7 December 2014 |
Miyamoto Saburo Annex, Setagaya Art Museum
(Tokyo) |
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| Part of a series focusing on different decades in the career of Western-style oil painter Miyamoto (1905-74), this show covered his output from the wartime and postwar years. After Japan's defeat, many of the country's artists are said to have burned their war-related work. Not so Miyamoto, who, whatever complicated feelings he may have had about the matter, did not attempt to erase evidence of his prolific production of war paintings. It's a lesson relevant to Japan today. |
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