The Rise And Fall Of The House Of Mario: Can Nintendo ‘Leave Luck To Heaven’ Anymore?

Nintendo once held the undisputed position as the king of video games thanks to its long-living handheld Gameboy series as well as early consoles like the Nintendo Entertainment System and its many successors. The company has captivated the gaming audience ever since the mid-70s when they decided to look to electronic games to turn around their fading fortunes as a playing card company. Now the likes of Donkey Kong, Link, Samus Aran, and, of course, Mario, are recognized names worldwide for casual and core gamers alike.

Today, however, things are different as competing gaming consoles with superior technology from Sony and Microsoft and numerous smartphone games threaten to bury the venerable video game mainstay.

In 2006 the Wii jump started Nintendo’s resurrection from the failure of its predecessor, the Gamecube. Many bought into the Wii’s unique motion controls, which led to it completely leapfrogging the PS3 and Xbox 360 in sales for years, even remained in short supply for a awhile. However, the gimmick kept the console popular only briefly as gamers realized the other consoles provided more mature, engaging content and not just family-friendly fare that Nintendo is known for.

The 3DS, the latest in Nintendo’s handheld line which launched this year, has suffered disappointing sales and in a few short months resorted to a large price cut to encourage stragglers to purchase the glasses-free 3D gaming experience. With the announcement of the Wii U over the summer, fans were confused by the unclear purpose of the controller-console hybrid that finally seemed to have caught up with the level of current generation consoles. Investors were also unconvinced as demonstrated by a severe drop in shares following the reveal. Another negative change in their stocks occurred following a string of announcements at the recent Tokyo Game Show, though the drop is hotly contested.

Though uneven, there is urgency behind these sudden changes. While core gamers are over the various gimmicks and casual players have plenty of options in the saturated mobile games market, how can Nintendo secure their future in the industry?

Japan Society’s panel Nintendo: What’s Next for the House of Mario? on October 6 features two experts who look at the Nintendo’s “ups-ups, downs-downs”, as one Japan Society Facebook fan so cleverly put it, and how the company can compete in today's market. Dan Sloan, author of Playing to Wiin: Nintendo and Video Game Industry’s Greatest Comeback, leads the discussion, and Jamin Warren, founder of Kill Screen Magazine, moderates. Whether attending as a concerned shareholder or an anxious fan of the Big N, the discussion promises insight into the now and future of the once undisputed gaming system king.

--Sean Tomizawa

Wilbur Ross: Ups From The Market’s Downs?

Wilbur Ross. Via.

Yesterday Wilbur Ross, chairman and CEO of WL Ross & Co. and chairman of Japan Society, sat down with Council on Foreign Relations’ Benn Steil to talk Greed vs. Fear: Making Sense of the Market Crash (watch the full video). The discussion used the August 2011 crash as a springboard to look at the economic situations of the U.S., Europe, China, and Japan, and how they can improve and fix their respective problems.

Reporting from the event, The Wall Street Journal noted that "Ross has to squint to see the bright side":

Wilbur Ross isn’t optimistic. He says he’s not totally pessimistic, but the financier is short on happy thoughts.

Over the course of an hour-long talk Wednesday afternoon at the Japan Society in New York, Mr. Ross voiced just about only one view that was in the not-totally-depressing camp. Stock markets, he says, “have priced in a very bearish scenario. Unless things get truly bad, the worst is probably over for the markets,” he said. 

While WSJ goes in-depth about the more pessimistic points, there were several observations and key takeaways for overall improvement from the discussion:

● The U.S. has gone two years with practically no budget. The lack of Democrat and Republican consensus on what needs to be cut is due to both sides aiming at each other’s "sacred cows". The resulting political inertia is the U.S. economy’s worst enemy. It prevents strong leadership and a lack of bold responses to various crises. The preoccupation with presidential and congressional elections, along with the Tea Party phenomenon, further polarizes the political structure doing little to help the economy.

● Greece has been at the brink of default for some time. The European Union never had preparations if a member leaves voluntarily or is forced to leave, which belies that a single currency means a cohesive political and fiscal union. European nations need to stop applying small fixes to crises and instead apply big changes to the point of overkill as soon as they come up.

● China is doing fairly well for itself despite a major housing shortage. The nation’s recent high economic growth means housing demand can be supplied without too much worry of a crash. Ross said that because of the economic success China is having, he would rather bet on their banks than the European ones.

● The U.S. and Japan both have cash rich economies, but they are not as liquid as they could be. True liquidity should be attained to help stimulate their respective economies.

● Japan, while the response to the recent earthquake was incredibly quick, needs to continue focusing on rebuilding the Tohoku region in order to help revitalize the economy. The cultural avoidance of change is also not helping progress, leading to further depression and low growth. Due to the labor shortage, Japan needs to incorporate more women and immigrants into the workforce.

● It would be most logical for Japanese companies to make more foreign investments especially while the yen is so strong. However, there is seemingly no push for that move, unlike in China where natural resources are in small numbers so they have dipped into Africa, South America, and even the U.S.

● Finally, there is a self-correcting mechanism in the economy that will only activate when governments decide to be more decisive with their actions, be more willing to invest, and generally be much bolder.

--Sean Tomizawa

Destination JS: Digging Dag Hammarskjold Plaza

Destination JS is a regular series exploring the sites, shops, and eateries surrounding Japan Society’s landmark building. 

Across from Japan Society is the cozy, tree-lined, avenue-length Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, a Midtown park where weary business folk, diplomats from all nations, and curious visitors find rest. Known as the "Gateway to the United Nations", the plaza is an oasis in the Turtle Bay neighborhood.

A steel gazebo at the Second Avenue entrance opens onto a brick promenade lined by light fixtures that take after old-fashioned gas lamps and benches modeled after those made for the 1939 World's Fair. Several fountains surround the plaza imbuing calm, while public sculptures and memorials stand in fascinating contrast to the urban, monochromatic surroundings.

One historically charged piece is Good Defeats Evil by Zurab Tsereteli, which is a sculpture of Saint George Slaying the Dragon comprised of parts from Soviet and American ballistic missiles.

Further in, one can stroll through the Katherine Hepburn Garden where the late movie great’s image and memorable quotes decorate stepping stones that form a path through seasonal flowers and vegetation.

For those who don’t speak Swedish, learning to correctly pronounce the plaza's name is easier than it looks. It comes from the plaza’s esteemed honoree and namesake, Nobel Peace prize recipient Dag Hjalmar Agne Carl Hammarskjöld, who served as the Secretary-General of the United Nations throughout most of the 50s and traveled all over the world for missions to end disputes and work towards world peace. Tragically, a plane crash while on the way to oversee the United Nations Force he established in Congo took his life 50 years ago this month. The city has preserved his legacy through the beautiful Dag Hammarskjold Plaza.

While most visitors to the plaza come to find peace from hectic everyday life, many come during the course of a year to fight for peace in their own country. Given the proximity to the United Nations and various consulates, public demonstrations are a regular occurrence. As a man who vigilantly aimed to progress world peace, Hammarskjold would have it no other way than to have the people of all nations freely speak their minds.

In addition, designated areas allow for a variety of performances and community events throughout the year, there is a constant rotation of public art, and every Wednesday fresh foods are available at a farmer's market beginning at 8:00 am.

Whether attending a film screening, performance, exhibit, discussion, or language class, Dag Hammarskjold Plaza is a memorable stop whenever you make Japan Society a destination.

--Sean Tomizawa

Top photo by Sean Tomizawa; bottom photo by This Week in New York.

Japan’s Textile Pioneers: Weaving Threads Of The Past Into The Future

When visitors climb the stairs to Japan Society’s new exhibit Fiber Futures: Japan’s Textile Pioneers, they are greeted by Kyoko Ibe’s Requiem, created specifically for the show. The large, dark purple, net-like weave adds mystery to the Society’s typically calm lobby, and yet engulfs the garden pool from above in an almost protective manner. Japan Society gallery director, Joe Earle, notes that the piece is:

a memorial to victims of the earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011. The fluidity of water is one of the miracles of nature, yet all of us were shocked and saddened to see how it could destroy so many lives and livelihoods. Ibe created Requiem from ancient indigo-dyed paper, made in a pristine natural environment and originally used for Buddhist scriptures. Sensing that our uncertain times cry out for the qualities of peace and stability embodied in this lovingly preserved material, she has twisted and worked it night and day for many months as a prayer for divine protection.

The piece is just one of 35 featured textile artworks that combine the beauty of tradition with eye-popping experimentation. The use of color and incredible shapes are the first things that may strike visitors, but upon closer inspection, the impossible textures and intricate techniques stun the imagination. Each installation, ranging from soccer ball size to meters wide and tall, is imbued with personality and a story. Those that hang on the walls cast equally striking shadows, subtly adding to their mystique.

Fiber Futures runs through December 18th. You can view more photos from the exhibit here and here. Related programming includes an exhibition talk, a day with family activities, an evening with former Miyake creative director Dai Fujiwara, and individual workshops on weaving, dyeing and embroidery.

If you can’t make it to Japan Society, you can check out the gorgeous catalogue or download the free app for iPhone or Android, and wrap yourself with Fiber Futures wherever you are in the world.

--Sean Tomizawa

Landmark Birthday for Japan Society’s Building

"I have tried to express in contemporary architecture the spirit of Japan." --Junzō Yoshimura

Days before the opening of its 104th gallery exhibition, just after turning 104 years old, Japan Society celebrated the 40th birthday of its building, recently designated New York City’s youngest landmark.

It was shortly after Japan Society launched the Japan Earthquake Relief Fund to aid recovery after the devastating tsunamis struck Northeast Japan when news broke that the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission approved four new landmarks, including Japan Society.

“We’re very proud of our building,” Japan Society gallery director Joe Earle told HyperAllergic at the time, adding, “It’s a remarkable place to walk into every day.” The article continues:

As a manifestation of the relationship between the United States and Japan, Earle points out, the design and construction of the Japan Society building came at a very interesting time. In 1971, “New York was just becoming aware of Japanese architecture. [The building] represents the rebuilding of the relationship between the two countries after World War II.” As a combination of Brutalist severity and Zen simplicity, the structure crosses artistic cultures.

“Looking out of my window now,” Earle describes during a phone conversation, “the long horizontal bars that filter the light give the whole front [facade] this kind of horizontality that was associated with Japanese domestic architecture … It’s a suggestion of Japanese architecture without actually being a copy of it, that’s what strongly appeals to me.” 

Completing a circle of great Midtown East architecture including the United Nations headquarters, Tudor City, the Ford Foundation building and Grand Central Station, Japan Society’s 5-story, charcoal gray building on 333 East 47th St. overlooks the cozy Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza Park.

The building is a smartly designed, geometrically playful edifice that contains warmth and reflective quietude—as useful for solitary thought as it is for intimate conversation and coming together to share ideas. While some might dismiss it as a “modernist box”, for most who visit, the brooding boxiness is a dark chocolate square with a liquid caramel center. It is the architectural incarnation of the quintessential New Yorker—austere and brusque perhaps at first blush, but warm, storied, and endlessly fascinating once you break the surface.

Known for infusing traditional Japanese elements in his modern works, architect Junzō Yoshimura used a much subtler blending of Japanese sensibility with contemporary materials in Japan Society’s building. The slats mentioned by Earle above, running horizontally on the second and third floors of the façade, are meant to evoke amado (Japanese storm windows used during typhoons). Hinoki (Japanese cypress) louvers in the exterior entry continue into the lobby ceiling, diffusing light and warming shadows. (Initially, the heat from light bulbs would release the wood’s fragrance, but regulations now require they be flame retardant, which masks the scent.)

Although the building has undergone two campaigns of adaptation and extension over the years, its original atmosphere is especially well preserved in the lobby area with a low, modular, precast concrete ceiling; extant original slate floors and walls; a large river stone near the entrance positioned as a foundation for seasonal floral arrangements; bamboo pond and waterfall; and stairs leading invitingly up to the gallery spaces, which encompass the entire second floor.

And while the building also contains a sub-level language center, a 262-seat state-of-the-art theater for lavish performances, pop concerts, film screenings and more; and three floors of administrative space, almost everyone who enters comments on its quiet beauty and remarkable stillness, welcome relief from the tireless energy of the city’s streets.

History

A brief history of the Turtle Bay neighborhood, home to Japan Society, the United Nations, missions of foreign governments and many private organizations including the International Institute of Education and the Ford Foundation, has been included in the Landmark Preservation Commission Japan Society Designation Report (PDF).

The area had remained little developed until after the Civil War, when residential and commercial development followed the opening of the Second and Third Avenue Elevated Railways around 1880. The large waterfront site along the East River between 42nd and 48th Streets was acquired by the Rockefellers, and John D. Rockefeller 3rd later donated the 47th street site to Japan Society in 1968.

“From the start, Japan Society was characterized as ‘the first building of contemporary Japanese design to be built in New York City’”, notes the report. Designed by Junzō Yoshimura in partnership with George G. Shimamoto during 1967-68, Japan Society, earlier called Japan House, opened in 1971.

Gabrielle Birkner in an article in The Real Deal refers to Japan Society as one of the notable exceptions to have been designed by a Japanese architect as it was not until much later that the architectural community in New York was receptive of design talent from abroad. According to the landmark's report, Yoshimura was “likely the first Japanese citizen to design a permanent structure in New York City.”

Shortly before the opening, Leah Gordon, an arts columnist for The New York Times on September 5, 1971 wrote:

In an area replete with UN Missions and consulates, this building has no seals, no mottos and is distinguished only by a slanted, 3-foot iron fence . . . It is soon apparent that this is no customary New York architectural atrocity but a sedate, jewel-like structure that, in its quiet way, commands attention.

Similarly, The Architectural Record in 1973 commented that the building:

...adds quite a dollop of civility to Dag Hammarskjold Plaza. Its exterior is quiet, nicely scaled and guardedly transparent: fleeting glimpses of the interior are afforded through bronze anodized aluminum screens, and the glass entrance doors.

In Yoshimura’s own words:

People the world over used to build their houses with local and traditional materials. Today, however, contemporary buildings all over the world use the same basic materials – concrete, steel and glass – yet different characters and nationalities can still be perceived amongst them. In designing Japan House I have tried to express in contemporary architecture the spirit of Japan.

 --Anu Tulachan and Shannon Jowett

Nuclear Blues

Via.

August 6th marked the 66th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, where a solemn commemoration has marked the years since 166,000 men, women and children lost their lives, tens of thousands of them to the lingering effects of radiation. This year, with Japan suffering in the aftermath of another nuclear disaster, the Hiroshima ceremony saw Prime Minister Naoto Kan deliver a speech in which he expressed contrition for believing in "the security myth of nuclear power". Mr Kan also promised an investigation into the incidents at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, which are fast becoming a source for much public criticism of his administration and the state of Tokyo bureaucracy and the Japanese nuclear industry in general.

Such hostility to nuclear power is nothing new in Japan, but the events in Fukushima have raised popular antipathy to its highest level in decades, with about 70 percent favouring a comprehensive overhaul of Japan’s energy policy according to a recent poll. Japan is already avowedly anti-nuclear in the area of the military, having voluntarily banned nuclear weapons from its territory since the 1950s, but many anti-nuclear groups have, until now, failed to equate the horrors of nuclear war with the peaceful development of nuclear power. Now, with the mayors of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki calling for a sea change in Japanese energy policy for the first time in decades, the Prime Minister himself is addressing Japan’s reliance on nuclear power before his political life draws to a close.

However, with nuclear power supplying about a third of Japan’s energy needs and the prospects of toughening economic times ahead, it is unclear exactly how any putative shift away from the atom might move forward without severe disruption to Japan’s infrastructure, to say nothing of the jobs that would be lost. As the U.S. and by extension the world brace for another possible recession, it would be a rude shock to the system for Japan to invalidate tens of thousands nuclear industry employees, particularly following the selfless heroism many of them displayed at the height of the crisis.

Yet, with popular anger on the rise, it is possible that even moves to establish an unprecedentedly high level of oversight of the nuclear industry will not placate the Japanese public, particularly as more details of the bureaucratic errors surrounding the catastrophe come to light.

The New York Times' recent report provides an example of such: the citizens of the town of Namie, close to the stricken Fukushima Daichi plant, are the latest to protest Tokyo’s handling of the disaster after they failed to receive any information on the dispersal of radiation, despite the accurate predictions from a government-commissioned computer scenario of radioactive release paths conducted far in advance of the meltdown. According to the town’s mayor, Tamotsu Baba, the failure to provide the scenario data to local residents lay with the unwillingness amongst senior officials to significantly enlarge the zone of the expensive and disruptive mass evacuations or to subject the Japan’s beleaguered nuclear industry to even harsher public scrutiny.

However, it is precisely the latter that the people seem to want. With the passing on August 3 of a law to allow the use of public funds to keep the operator of the Fukushima Daichi plant afloat, it is difficult to imagine that the Japanese populace will accept anything else. 

--Tobias Voss

JAPAN CUTS 2011: Peeps & Parties

Can we get a what-what for our 1, 2, … 3 Points after party?

This year’s JAPAN CUTS film festival exceeded expectations opening weekend, selling out 7 of 10 screenings and hosting the wild Yakuza Weapon Party with appearances by co-directors Tak Sakaguchi and Yudai Yamaguchi.

Along with a multitude of screenings through July 22, there are several more special guests attending this year’s fest, including some of Japan’s top filmmakers and actors and actresses who take part in exclusive Q&A’s and post-screening parties.

Following the international premiere of Three☆Points on July 15, director Masashi Yamamoto and actress Sora Aoi will take part in a post-screening Q&A and and may stick around for the rockin' 1,2...3 Points after party.

Yamamoto’s career has spanned a period of almost three decades since his debut film Carnival in the Night (1983). Aoi is an internationally renowned celebrity whose roots in the Japanese AV industry propelled her career to pinku eiga then to television dramas, and finally to mainstream entertainment. She has even branched off into the music industry (namely pop). Her performance in Three☆Points can be seen as her branching into more dramatic and serious films

Following the North American premiere of The Seaside Motel on July 16, director Kentaro Moriya will take part in a Q&A session. Since Moriya began his career in music videos it is no surprise that his films reflect the same essence of flash and style that encapsulated his earlier career. The Seaside Motel stays true to this ideal as it fully embodies Moriya’s signature flair.

Also on the 16th, the international premiere of A Liar and a Broken Girl will host director and writer Natsuki Seta and actor Shota Sometan, who introduce the film and take part in a Q&A. The film is characteristic of Seta’s stylistic audacity as it boldly fuses teen romance with serial killer horror.

Directly prior to the New York premiere of Haru’s Journey on July 20, director and writer Masahiro Kobayashi will make a special statement paying homage to the victims of the recent earthquake in Japan (the film was shot in the Tohoku region prior to devastation by the 3/11 tsunami). The screening will be followed with a reception that includes the appearance of his regular co-producer (and wife) Naoko Kobayashi. Half of all ticket sales for this screening will go to the Japan Earthquake Relief Fund.

In addition to the 1, 2, … 3 Points after party, the festival will conclude with the festival concludes with the  JAPAN CUTS Loose Closing Night Party following the final film Into the White Night. Details will be announced next week, so stay tuned and hope to see you there!

--August Dinwiddie

Echoes of Devastation: Japan Four Months After The Quake

Sendai before and now. Via.

The recurrence last weekend of a powerful earthquake followed by a small tsunami in the same regions of Japan which were hit four months ago briefly brought Japan back into the news, although there was fortunately little damage and no reported injuries or deaths this time.

It was a reminder that the current situation in the tsunami zone remains a grim one for many. The slowness of the government’s provision of basic relief to those affected by the catastrophe has forced many locals in the affected areas to fend for themselves and roused private industries to take action.

Matters have not been helped by such occurrences as the resignation of Japan's disaster reconstruction minister within a week of his appointment (after his threats to withhold aid to boroughs which did not have good ideas for reconstruction) and the government’s difficulties implementing a program of stress tests for nuclear plants. With potentially decades remaining for the cleanup of nuclear materials within Fukushima alone, it is quite possible that we may see an increase in local citizen initiatives as a matter of pure necessity.

Fortunately, changes to the laws governing the tax status of Japan’s non-profit organizations (NPOs) are due after the flood of over 480,000 volunteers into the earthquake zone was met by a confused and often obstructive response from some local officials, many of whom were unprepared to accept help from outside official channels. Where the impetus from the Kobe earthquake of 1995 led to the first explosion in NPO numbers after new legislation was introduced in 1998, the 2011 earthquake and tsunami appears set to make Japan’s 80,000 or so civil society organizations more effective.

This cannot come soon enough for residents at the Shizugawa High School Evacuation Center in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture. Four months after the small fishing port of Minamisanriku was virtually wiped out, the survivors live in a 3,000-aquare-foot location housing 40 families with no running water. Supplied by the Japanese Self-Defense Forces with food and medicine and still going into work or school where possible, the evacuees face an uncertain future, as the government has yet to decide whether or not the residents can rebuild in the tsunami affected area or if they must relocate. Whatever the outcome, it is clear that victims such as the former inhabitants of Minamisanriku will require significant assistance in the short and possibly the long term.

Reporting Recovery Now and Ahead

One hopes that the potential for another disaster so soon after the first may refocus world attention from the economic costs and high-level political effect of the quake to the plight of the individual Japanese at ground level.

While media coverage has dwindled in comparison to the struggles facing many in Japan’s northeast, there has been a surge of optimistic stories amid dire situations coinciding with the four month anniversary.

The New York Times profiles Sendai’s steady recovery and examines how Japan is solving the problem of approximately 27 million tons of debris created by the tsunami. Similarly, The Wall Street Journal profiles the hard-hit city of Rikuzentakata, which lost a tenth of its population.

EastAsiaForum looks at the crises’ impact on the U.S.-Japan alliance, focusing on synergy between Japan’s Self-Defense Forces and the U.S. military.

Asahi reports on the outpour of support from the Japan Expo in Paris; and the touching story of a father’s desire to restore his daughter’s piano—the only thing left in their home after the tsunami.

The Times also carried related technology and sports coverage, profiling Google's responses to disaster stricken Japan, and showing how baseball has brought stability to students displaced by the tsunami.

We’ve recently begun receiving updates from the organizations that have received support from the Japan Earthquake Relief Fund.The Japan NPO Center announced support to six local NPOs in the Tokohu region, and JEN reports from their work in Ishinomaki.

These personal stories are absolutely necessary to aid and illustrate the revival of the devastated regions of Japan. As much as possible, this blog will balance major events in Japan’s recovery with individual accounts from those experiencing and taking part in reconstruction first-hand.

--Tobias Voss

JAPAN CUTS Lands + Under-The-Radar Gems

© 2011 “Osamu Tezuka’s Buddha” production

Japan Society’s fifth consecutive JAPAN CUTS film festival (July 7-22) is the world’s largest festival of Japanese cinema, featuring 33 screenings, 32 films, 31 premieres and an array of special guests and exclusive parities.

Highlighting the wild diversity and extreme artistry of Japan’s newest movies and encompassing “the hard, rough, sharp, smooth and soft edges of today’s Japanese film scene,” the selection ranges from eye-popping blockbusters to jarring genre flicks to heart aching indies.

Samuel Jamier, Japan Society’s chief film programmer who curated the festival, said “a substantial number of titles this year can’t be easily categorized or confined to strict genre boundaries.” In a video interview (below), he also hoped the festival gives audiences “the most original and creative” examples of what’s coming out of Japan today.



As with years in the past, JAPAN CUTS 2011 includes several co-presentations with the New York Asian Film Festival, including the sold out July 7 opening film Osamu Tezuka’s Buddha: The Great Departure, an animated adaptation of Tezuka’s spectacular and philosophically deep manga of the Buddha (also screening July 10); the “almost impossible to define” Milocrorze: A Love Story July 10; and JAPAN CUTS’ first sell-out Gantz, a grindhouse adaptation of a popular Japanese manga that pits teenagers in trendy black leather costumes with advanced war gear against aliens hiding on Earth.

Opening weekend also contains some not-to-be-missed gems, such as Love & Loathing & Lulu & Ayano (July 8), an intricately plotted tale of an introverted, shy office worker who does part time in the porn industry. The noiseful Ringing in their Ears (July 7) revolves around a rock group competing with managers, obsessed groupies, shut-ins, single parents and kindergarten teachers as they prepare for a concert.

Firefox News’ Peter Gutiérrez, who has been writing about the festival since its inception in 2007, featured some of his favorite under-the-radar fare (including Sword of Desperation, A Night in Nude, Torso and Birthright), and Steve Dollar writing for The Wall Street Journal had this to say:

The series also offers less easily characterized films. The 4½-hour "Heaven's Story" marks a serious turn by director Takahisa Zeze (known as the "King of Pink" for his softcore sex comedies), who maps a sprawling revenge drama about a little girl who comes of age obsessed with the serial killings of her family. Sora Aoi, the AV idol (sex star) turned mainstream actress, stars in Masashi Yamamoto's "Three Points," an episodic drama that surveys the lower depths in three Japanese cities. Likewise, Kazuyoshi Kumakiri's "Sketches of Kaitan City" brings a realist eye to the working-class struggles described in the fiction of the late Yasushi Sato.

--August Dinwiddie

Note: JAPAN CUTS opens today. Tickets can be purchased online, through the box office at 212-715-1258, or in person at Japan Society. Members receive $3-$4 discounts, and if you purchase five tickets or more, you get $2 off each ticket (only for orders made by phone or in-person). Also, we’re testing out a new screen so enjoy the new view!

Gantz tix already gontz! © 2011 Gantz Film Partners

Sayonara 'Kitty': A Last Look At Japan Society's Hit Exhibit

Bye Bye Deer! Photo by Richard Goodbody.

Since the time when Japan opened up to the outside world, its people and culture have often been scrutinized through the lens of kawaii aesthetic, or the fondness for all things small and cute. Laying the background for kawaii that has dominated not only the cultural phenomena within Japan but also how Japan is viewed from the outside, David Elliot, curator of Bye Bye Kitty!!! Between Heaven and Hell in Contemporary Japanese Art, writes in the exhibition catalogue:

The paternalistic outsider’s view, equating lack of Western modernity with premodernity, feudalism, and by extension, a state of immaturity, was founded on the notion that Japan was essentially “different” from other countries, and Japanese “childishness” could easily be proven by a perceived taste for miniature versions of things or a preference for natural beauty and materials.

It is not rare that views regarding Japanese contemporary art take a trajectory quite similar to how Japan was viewed from the outside and as result, render Japanese contemporary art devoid of maturity and originality. Elliott continues:

Since the early twentieth century, Japanese art has developed in conversation with Western modernism, but Western commentators have too easily dismissed Japan’s recent and contemporary art as a derivative reflection of its own image (some children are very good at copying) or embraced it as quaintly traditional, otaku, or kawaii – a stereotypical expression of childlike grace that the simply drawn, mouthless features of Hello Kitty epitomize in their bland inscrutability.

Hello Kitty, a character developed by Sanrio and marketed with huge success far and wide epitomizes the dominance of kawaii. A 2004 Japan Times editorial entitled "Time for Goodbye Kitty", highlighted, albeit with reservations, the reign of Hello Kitty in commercial as well as non-commercial spheres. Calling Hello Kitty “the expressionless icon celebrating its 30th anniversary [in 2004]” the editorial cited its appearances on a MasterCard debit card in the United States and as a UNICEF “special friend of the children” to raise funds for girls’ education programs.

Takashi Murakami, the curator of Little Boy: The Arts of Japan’s Exploding Subculture, an exhibition presented by Japan Society in collaboration with the Public Art Fund in 2005, argued that Japanese art forms showed a “retreat from the adult world into an infantile, ‘superflat’ universe” owing to “Japan’s political emasculation” following World War II. Bye, Bye, Kitty!!! is an attempt to present the work of artists who have, in Elliott's words, “produced work that indicates a more complicated, adult view of life, melding traditional viewpoints with perception of present and future in radical and sometimes unsettling combinations”. The artists featured in the exhibition were born between mid-60s and early 80s (with the exception of one) and have been witness to rapid, and at times, drastic and overpowering transformations in multiple facets of the Japanese society.

This hybridity, one of the essences of Japanese pictorial creativity, has created a fertile seedbed in which the struggle between extremes of heaven and hell, fantasy and nightmare, ideal and real take place. There is no room for Kitty’s blankness here. But the boundaries between the extremes are often unclear. In a fiercely critical, socially rigid, and historically loaded environment, where irony is used as a weapon, one element may be unveiled to reveal its opposite.

Bye, Bye, Kitty!!! presents the work of 16 artists, half of them women. Among over 40 objects, three new works were unveiled including Kohei Nawa’s taxidermized deer covered with a skin of plastic beads to form an irregular, globular skin that confounds expectations of sight and touch; Tomoko Shioyasu’s large-scale installation, employing a version of the decorous Japanese art of stencil cutting to snip, slit, cut and slice a ten-foot sheet of paper into a membrane-like form that animates surrounding space with projected light; and Chiharu Shiota’s installation Dialogue with Absence, recently unveiled in Paris, which combines a painted wedding dress with pumps, tubing, and red-dyed water to create an umbilical network of linked veins that suggests a dreamlike, unconscious state of anxiety.

While the exhibit closes this Sunday, it will live on online, in apps (for both iPhone and Android), and in the catalogue published by Yale University Press as part of their Japan Society Series.

--Anu Tulachan