Carnegie Hall's Passport To Japan

Seiji Ozawa infuses New York with Japan.

Everyone knows how to get to Carnegie Hall (practice!), but who knew once you got there it would be a trip around the world!

A true New York institution, Carnegie Hall is what people think of when they dream of the world's finest Western classical music and its best performers. Carnegie Hall has also taken on the role of cultural ambassador, presenting stimulating series of world music. Last year they gave us the inspired Ancient Path, Modern Voices Chinese series, and this year they've outdone themselves with a staggering feast of Japanese culture.

JapanNYC is a citywide festival that "explores the Japan of today, where newfound artistic sensibilities continue to transform and revitalize the cultural landscape." The festival features some 65 Japan-related events, including several Carnegie Hall produced concerts featuring world renowned artists, traditional and new Japanese theater, manga workshops, film, butoh dance, pop art exhibitions, and a variety of music genres.

Sprawling from December through April, JapanNYC was spirited by the legendary conductor Seiji Ozawa, who conducts two main event concerts with Japanese ensembles he has established. On December 14, he officially launches the festival with the Saito Kinen Orchestra. The program features a U.S. premiere co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall from composer Gondai Atsuhiko, Mitsuko Uchida  performing Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3, and what is sure to be a luscious performance of Brahm's first (there will be an encore performances of this program on December 15 and 18). Maestro Ozawa delivers another cornerstone concert in the second half of the festival March-April with a rare overseas appearances by the Seiji Ozawa Ongaku-juku.

Honored to be part of the festival, Japan Society's contributions include the classic Zen painting exhibit The Sound of One Hand (through January 9), the contemporary Japanese visual art show Bye Bye Kitty!!!  (opens March 18), and rare performances of ancient noh and kyogen theater (March 24-26.

While the full schedule is wonderfully overwhelming, December highlights, in addition to those mentioned above, include:

Takemitsu Film Festival – A 14 Day film fest showing films that were scored by famed Japanese composer, Toru Takemitsu presented by Film Forum. Begins December 3.

Calligraphy and Manga Education Events – The New York Public Library hosts teen manga-drawing workshops with Misako Rocks. December 9, 16.

Peter and the Wolf – Guggenheim Museum presents contemporary performance of the famous Russian tale featuring an installation inspired by contemporary Japanese anime and features a newly commissioned visual concept by Japanese artist Rei Sato. December 11, 12, 17, 18.

Winds and Strings of Change: Glories of the Japanese Traditional Music Heritage – Another tribute to Toru Takemitsu featuring the use of traditional Japanese instruments such as the Biwa, the Shakuhachi and the Koto presented at the Miller Theater. December 16.

A Tribute to Toru Takemitsu – Held at Zankel Hall, this performance will feature some improvisations on Takemitsu’s film scores. December 17.

Yoshitomo Nara: Nobody’s Fool – Asia Society's acclaimed exhibit featuring tons of work one of the world’s most cutting edge artists. Through January 2.

On Becoming an Artist: Isamu Noguchi and his Contemporaries, 1922–1960 – The Noguchi Museum  highlights the relationship between famed Japanese landscape artist Isamu Noguchi to other artists during his time period. Through April 24.

T.D., S.J.

Across The Divide, 150 Years of Cross-Culture Lotion Provides An Ocean Of Motion

Hip-hoppers in Japan. Image via UCLA Asia Institute.

Whether it's food, pop music or the landscape of our lives, a curious cultural hybrid of Japanese and American culture exists in all walks--a fact particularly astounding because the U.S. and Japan have only been open to each other since 1860.

In Fusion in Motion: 150 Years of Japan-America Integration, Japan Society’s Lectures Program brings together a dynamically disparate posse of specialists to explore cultural cross-pollination. The panel features Theodore C. Bestor, one of Havard's top anthropology professors (his Tsukiji: The Fish Market at the Center of the World, has been called "one the best books recently published on Japan"); Ian Condry, who jives on media and cultural studies at MIT, and quite literally wrote the book on Japanese hip-hop; and Marc Peter Keane, a master landscape architect and author of many books on Japanese garden design.

The panel celebrates the 150th anniversary of the first Japanese delegation to the United States, marking the beginning of modern bilateral U.S.-Japan diplomatic relations. At this time business and diplomatic engagement took root and cultural exchange flourished. Fusion in Motion examines the fruits of these exchanges from three areas that have been particularly influenced by the cross-flow of ideas and techniques: music, food and landscape architecture.

The program is co-presented with the Museum of the City of New York, which, in late June, presents a mélange of historical artifacts from samurai visiting New York during the period! 

N.O., S.J.

Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters March Toward the Sunset

Sunday June 13th is the last chance to be speared, spooked and spirited away by Utagawa Kuniyoshi’s ukiyo-e imagination at Japan Society Gallery's Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters. Featuring over 130 of Kuniyoshi’s sly and enthralling woodblock prints, the show has been one of Japan Society’s most well-attended traditional art exhibitions of all time. And no wonder: the art is cool. From the first rooms, featuring epic battles with supernatural beasties, through rooms where portraits of beautiful ladies, effete avengers and strapping warriors tantalize from the walls, all the way to the surreal quirky comics in the final room (cats mimicking the 53 stations of the Tōkaidō!), walking through the exhibition was like peeling the curtain back and peering into a world just to the left of real.

As Arthur Lubow wrote in New York magazine, Kuniyoshi’s art wasn’t just witty and fun to look at; he was something of a pioneer as well:

“In an almost 50-year career, spanning the first half of the nineteenth century, Kuniyoshi pushed across boundaries. He uses every part of the frame, deploying strong colors and powerful forms. He also works many genres: landscapes, beautiful women, actors, cats, and mythical animals, not to mention the battles of samurai and legendary heroes for which he is best known. Formally, he is brilliantly innovative: His three-panel compositions revolutionized Japanese art by spreading one image over an entire triptych.”

Kuniyoshi’s prints got rave reviews from local New York press: The New Yorker said his "eye for the fantastic and ghoulish remains unparalleled," CityArts found it "impressive," and Thrillist called them "Psychedelic" and "the venerable origins of bad-ass Japanese art." The New York Times commented on Kuniyoshi's erotic inclinations, featured briefly in the catalogue, but not in the physical exhibition.

After June 13th Japan Society’s mangaka-in-residence, Hiroki Otsuka, will bid us adieu, too, having worked since the exhibition's opening. In the meantime, he’ll be finishing up his original Kuniyoshi-based manga, Samurai Beam. Check out the final pages as they get posted online!

Too busy or geographically miss-located to catch the show before it closes? There are two ways it can live with you forever. Check out curator Timothy Clark's 300+ page, full color, gorgeously illustrated catalogue published by our co-presenters at London's Royal Academy of Arts. Or take home one of 36 high-quality Kuniyoshi reproductions, lovingly digitized and sized by our friends at the Museum of Fine Arts.

Japan Society Gallery is open this Thursday 11 am-6 pm, Friday 11 am-9 pm, and Saturday and Sunday 11 am-5 pm. Admission is free all the time for children under 16, Japan Society members, and,  thanks to the NEA's Blue Star Museums initiative, active duty military service members and their families. It is also free to everyone on Friday, 6-9 pm.

Catch the exhibition before it’s too late!

N.O.

Photo caption: TOP, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Kabuki Actor Onoe Kikugorō III as the Spirit of the Cat Stone, c. 1835, olor woodblock print, R: 14 1/2 x 10 1/8 in., C: 14 5/8 x 10 in., L: 14 1/2 x 10 1/8 in, American Friends of The British Museum (The Arthur R. Miller Collection) 19408, photo © Trustees of The British Museum. BOTTOM, details of the exhibition catalogue Kuniyoshi: From the Arthur R. Miller Collection by Timothy Clark.

America's Heroes: Meet Graphic Heroes

Starting Memorial Day, the National Endowment for the Arts and Blue Star Families have echeloned over 700 museums and galleries across America for the Blue Star Museums initiative.

Japan Society is honored to be taking part, inviting active duty military personnel and their families to enjoy Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters for FREE through the exhibition's June 13 closing. With New York City's Fleet Week in full swing, we'll start the Blue Star Museums action a bit early on Saturday, May 29.

Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters' 1850s pacific overtures are filled with selfless samurai, tattooed tough guys, lovely ladies, ghastly ghosts, cozy cats, and rockin' octopi. The critics have noted Kuniyoshi's "eye for the fantastic and the ghoulish remains unmatched," and his "greatest prints represent turbulent, epic visions" that are "as fresh as this morning’s manga."

Blue Star Museums lasts through Labor Day. Though Japan Society Gallery closes June 13 until fall, other New York City organizations taking part include: American Folk Art Museum, Asia Society, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn Children's Museum, Bronx Museum, Guggenheim, The Jewish Museum, The Met, MoMA, Museum of Arts and Design, Museum of Jewish Heritage, Museum of the City of New York, New York Botanical Garden, New York City Fire Museum, New York Transit Museum, Noguchi Museum, Staten Island Children's Museum,  Wave Hill, and the Whitney.

This Memorial Day Weekend, Japan Society Gallery is open Friday until 9 pm, and Saturday & Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm. The Gallery is closed Monday. As always, members and children under 16 are free anytime.

Have a safe holiday!

(NO, SJ)

What a Busy Weekend!

Taiko Masala, courtesy of Brooklyn Botanical Garden

The Brooklyn Botanical Gardens hosted a a phenomenal weekend celebrating Sakura Matsuri and Japanese culture that showcased over 60 events and performances, including Taiko drumming, Okinawan pop, a Samurai drama, sushi-shaped cookies, anime stand-up comedy, and so much more!

Japan Society ran its own booth, which was maintained by some of our diligent staff members. Our payroll manager, Manuel Martinez was pleased to note that many of the adults that accompanied the younger crowd enjoyed stopping at our table, asking questions, and picking up our pamphlets. And Cynthia Sternau, our publications manager, had this to say:

"The lack of cherry blossoms and NYC's usual weekend transportation snafus didn't stop the crowds of garden lovers and Japanophiles from pouring into the BBG for the Sakura Matsuri this past weekend. Japan Society's table was located in the Osborne Garden, right off the Eastern Parkway entrance, under a nice pink tent but a bit too close to the J-Lounge's sound system (Taiko & Tap was really loud!). Our gorgeous Kuniyoshi palm cards featuring four woodblock prints from the current Gallery exhibition were much admired! In fact, compliments were paid to Japan Society's programs by many who stopped by the table, including mentions of a late night at j-CATION and Film's recent "Dangerous Women" series. In fact, it was a whole lot of fun and very good outreach to take Japan Society to Brooklyn for the weekend."

That same Sunday, children and adults celebrated Children's Day (Kodomo no hi) here at Japan Society. There were performances of Japan’s classic children’s stories Peach Boy (Momotaro) and Golden Boy (Kintaro) and also song and dance related to the festival by Theatre Arts Japan – KIDS, directed by Eriko Ogawa. The attendees of this popular event enjoyed traditional snacks and created their own samurai helmets (kabuto) and carp streamers, which are traditional Children’s Day decorations.

If you wandered through Times Square afterwards, you probably ran directly into demonstrators, who were led by Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba and Nagasaki Mayor Tomihisa Taue.

The mayors and visiting atomic-bomb survivors, as well as members of nongovernmental organizations from around the world, held a 2-km march to seek the elimination of nuclear weapons ahead of a major nonproliferation review, reported The Japan Times. Calls for a nuclear-free world were also made at other events in New York, many led by Japanese campaigners who were visiting the city to have their voices heard at the five-year U.N. Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference that started on Monday and will run through May 28.

Leur Existence - Tree Project

THE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK GALLERY

December 9, 2009 - February 12, 2010
Hiroshi Sunari
Leur Existence - Tree Project

Opening Reception
Wednesday, December 9th
6pm to 8:30pm

Over 60 years ago, the city of Hiroshima was decimated by one nuclear bomb. Hibaku trees, those that still live from the time of the atomic bombing, have shown an inspiring ability to persevere. Since 2005, Sunari has been collecting seeds from hibaku trees in Hiroshima and has distributed them to nearly 400 Tree Project participants in 23 countries. Leur Existence – Tree Project will feature a selection of these plants, which have been donated by the participants, as well as photographic and written documentation of the process. Plants will be presented in ceramic elephant-foot pots, designed and created by the artist.

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This is really exciting. We featured the artist’s powerful White Elephant—a reaction to his experience being downtown on the morning of September 11, 2001—in our 2007 exhibition, Making a Home: Japanese Contemporary Artists in New York.