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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.
2 February 2015
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What Clothes Can Do: 20 Years After the Great Hanshin Earthquake
17 January - 7 April 2015
Kobe Fashion Museum
(Hyogo)
A fashion museum delivers its own take on the 20th anniversary of the earthquake that destroyed much of its home city. The works on display do function as clothing, but the question remains whether these very conceptual designs are of much use in coping with natural disasters. Exhibited in this context, do they really have something to say about the relevance of art in the real world?

The Human Form / Sculpture
16 December 2014 - 22 March 2015
Shizuoka City Museum of Art
(Shizuoka)
Sculptors Chie Aoki, Akiko Tsuda, and Ayato Fujiwara all specialize in human figures, but employ different media. Aoki uses lacquer, Fujiwara ceramics, while Tsuda clothes her resin statues in light fabrics. More than the forms, it is the materials that draw the eye; in some ways these works seem more like examples of industrial design than of sculpture.
Ikko Narahara: Domains

18 November 2014 - 1 March 2015

The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
(Tokyo)
These austere, stately images are the best-known early works by venerable photographer Narahara (b. 1931). From a set of 87 prints donated by NIkon in 2011, the exhibition presents two series -- respectively portraying life in a Hokkaido monastery and inmates of a Wakayama women's prison -- in essentially the same format as they appeared in the 1978 book Domains: Garden of Silence / Within the Walls (Asahi Sonorama).
Stories Told by Tiles - Understanding Icons

4 December 2014 - 21 February 2015

LIXIL Gallery
(Tokyo)
This compact show at home-equipment maker LIXIL's Ginza gallery offers a selection of tile art from three disparate regions of the world, culled from the collection of the INAX Tile Museum in suburban Nagoya. The focus is on European tiles, in which Biblical motifs predominate; Chinese brick tiles from the 10th to 13th centuries and ceramic tiles from the 17th to 20th centuries; and Persian tiles depicting legendary events and heroes.
Takamatsu Jiro: Mysteries

2 December 2014 - 1 March 2015
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
(Tokyo)
Augmenting the late avant-gardist's Shadow series is "Shadow Lab," an installation that allows visitors to play with, and photograph, their own shadows. The roomy exhibition space contains his point and perspectives series from the sixties, Oneness and Compound from the seventies, and the paintings he continued to turn out until his death in 1998. An observation platform in the center, built to the scale of Takamatsu's studio (remarkably small), affords a bird's-eye view of the show.
The 20th Anniversary of the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake

22 November 2014 - 8 March 2015
Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art
(Hyogo)
January 17 marked the 20th anniversary of the massive earthquake that devastated Kobe, Awaji, and other parts of Hyogo Prefecture. Several regional museums are banding together this year to hold exhibitions on the theme, with this one at the Prefectural Museum taking the lead. Featured are over 110 paintings, photographs, and sculptures.
The Fab Mind: Hints of the Future in a Shifting World

24 October 2014 - 1 February 2015
21_21 Design Sight
(Tokyo)
This ambitious show introduces a broad diversity of designs that purport to address the future of our world. Among the highlights: A Million Times, an array of clocks whose hands periodically align to form text, by Humans Since 1982; artificial organs comprising a "human water bottle" for survival a century hence, by takram design engineering; Mine Kafon, a rolling, wind-powered device for detonating land mines, by Massoud Hassani; and photographer Takashi Homma's architectural Camera Obscura Study.
Mai Yoshikawa Exhibition

24 - 29 November 2014
Gallery Haku 3
(Osaka)
This was up-and-coming ceramist Yoshikawa's debut solo show. Her works consist of unglazed, mass-produced dishes which she covers with collages of picture decals and photo cutouts from fashion magazines. The techniques employed in this process would seem to be at polar ends of the creative spectrum, but Yoshikawa makes it all work with her artful layouts and pop sensibilities.
Yoshiyuki Ooe Solo Exhibition: Y Atelier
21 November - 20 December 2014
Tezukayama Gallery
(Osaka)
Ooe's first solo exhibition in three years presented a tableau of figures of young boys with chickens or flower bouquets for heads, or reading a pair of spread butterfly wings like pages of a newspaper, or holding up a life-size stingray. Not only does he create his own idiosyncratic world with elements that are both doll-like and sculptural, but his perfectionist's attention to detail -- particularly in replicating fauna ranging from chickens to stingrays to butterflies -- is nothing short of awe-inspiring.
Osamu Jareo: Totsutotsu Dance Part 2: The Lessons of Love
28 - 30 November 2014

Asahi Art Square
(Tokyo)
This new work by dancer and choreographer Jareo is an extension of the Series Totsutotsu performances he has held at a home for elderly requiring special care in Maizuru, Kyoto Prefecture. Produced by Jareo with registered nurse and clinical philosopher Masaru Nishikawa and cultural anthropologist Takeshi Toyohira, the project, which includes workshops and seminars, is now in its fifth year.
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