Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo
The Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo in Kiyosumi-Shirakawa is reopening after renovation.
To commemorate the reopening, two exhibitions have been organized across the special exhibition galleries and the collection galleries, presenting the museum’s collection on a large scale throughout the entire venue.
On March 29, the first day of the reopening, admission is free and the museum’s opening hours are extended until 20:00.
Reopening commemorative events will also be held during the exhibition period.
As part of this renovation, aging facilities and equipment were updated, new signage was installed so that visitors can enjoy the museum in every corner, the public spaces along the Kiba Park approach were redeveloped, and the art library was renewed.
In addition, new restaurants and cafés & lounges will open, and the museum shop will reopen as well.
Weavers of Worlds: A Century of Flux in Japanese Modern / Contemporary Art
“Weavers of Worlds: A Century of Flux in Japanese Modern / Contemporary Art,” the special exhibition marking the reopening, revisits a century of Japanese art from the 1910s to the present through the lens of the museum’s collection. It reconsiders that history through artists — the “weavers” — who developed their own creations by editorially engaging with both old and new modes of expression.
From the Taisho era, when Ryusei Kishida was active, up to the present, the “weavers” of each period have grappled with the issues of their time and have made critical work concerning “the state of Japanese art.”
Rather than being grounded in an unwavering historiography, the narrative of Japanese modern and contemporary art attempted in this exhibition focuses on the activities of artists who create while unsettling the subject through the selective “editing” of various elements, and it explores the background of those practices.
Furthermore, the exhibition also introduces creations concerning Kiba, the area where the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo is located and which has changed with the times.
By surveying important groups of works dispersed throughout the history of Japanese modern and contemporary art across all three floors of the museum’s exhibition rooms, one aspect of a century of history is likely to come to light.
Three highlights of this exhibition
- This is the first opportunity to use all three floors of the special exhibition galleries to introduce the museum’s rich body of experimentally minded works — from the 1910s to the present — from a perspective that connects them to today’s creative practices.
- The exhibition reconsiders Japanese modern and contemporary creation from the angle of the endeavors of “weavers” who have edited a diverse range of old and new expressions and techniques, and who have entered into creative relationships with society. Through them, we may begin to see a pioneering mode of production that itself takes as its theme the very nature of creation in a Japan of hybrid cultures.
- From the museum’s collection, which has run alongside the diverse states of contemporary art, the exhibition introduces not only choice works but also precious materials from before the war, such as creative print magazines and special archive holdings from the library.
MOT Collection: Welcome Back / Nice to Meet You
The Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo currently houses approximately 5,400 works in its collection. Its scope centers on postwar art and spans a wide range of genres, from the modern to the contemporary period.
The “MOT Collection,” which introduces these holdings, sets up various angles for each exhibition period so that even the same work can always be viewed from a new perspective, endeavoring to communicate the diverse charms of contemporary art.
During the nearly three-year closure, the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo newly acquired around 400 works. Accordingly, this fiscal year’s collection exhibition, held to commemorate the reopening, focuses on these newly acquired works.
The first installment of the collection exhibition, “Welcome Back / Nice to Meet You,” focuses on groups of works produced mainly in the 2010s and also unveils works that have been recently restored. For visitors who have seen the “MOT Collection” before as well as those seeing it for the first time, the show should offer an experience where one can encounter the individual charms of each work in the newly renovated exhibition rooms.
The artworks to be encountered in this newly renovated museum are highly anticipated.
The future activities of the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, including its main building, are worth watching. We look forward to them.
Overview
Special Exhibition “Weavers of Worlds — A Century of Flux in Japanese Modern / Contemporary Art”
Venue: Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Special Exhibition Galleries 3F, 1F, B2F
Dates: March 29 (Fri) – June 16 (Sun), 2019 (Special exhibition and collection exhibition held concurrently)
Closed: Mondays (open on April 29 and May 6), May 7 (Tue)
Hours: 10:00–18:00 *Open until 20:00 on Friday, March 29
Admission: General 1,300 yen (1,040 yen) / University and vocational school students, 65 and over 900 yen (720 yen) / Junior high and high school students 600 yen (480 yen) / Free for elementary school children and under
*Amount in parentheses is the group rate for parties of 20 or more. *Admission is free on Friday, March 29. *A special exhibition ticket also grants entry to the collection exhibition.
Participating artists (planned)
Ay-O, Makoto Aida, Aimitsu, Yutokutaishi Akiyama, Setsu Asakura, Nobuya Abe, Ikuma Arishima, Tatsuo Ikeda, Hakutei Ishii, Takashi Ishida, Taro Izumi, Yukihisa Isobe, Zon Ito, Yoichi Umetsu, Ryuzaburo Umehara, Eiko Urushibara, Ei-Q, Oscar Oiwa, Shinro Ohtake, Yoshitaka Ohno, Kenjiro Okazaki, Taro Okamoto, Yuki Ogura, Yoko Ono, Toshinobu Onosato, Koshiro Onchi, Sachiko Kazama, Yuki Katsura, Izumi Kato, Taro Kato, Akira Kanayama, Teppei Kaneuji, Takeshiro Kanokogi, On Kawara, Tai Kambara, Ryusei Kishida, Tamiji Kitagawa, Shozo Kitadai, Shohachi Kimura, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Meiro Koizumi, Michisei Kono, Masato Kobayashi, Tetsuro Komai, Yoshishige Saito, Yori Saito, Ushio Shinohara, Toshi Shimizu, Kazuo Shiraga, Fuminao Suenaga, Kishio Suga, Tadashi Sugamata, Iwane Sumiya, Akira Kiyomiya, Minami Tada, Atsuko Tanaka, Koki Tanaka, Chizuko Tanaka, Masaya Chiba, Sadao Tsubaki, Masao Tsuruoka, Aiko Tezuka, Masaaki Terada, Seiji Togo, Hisao Domoto, Motohiro Tomii, Yasuko Toyoshima, Hiromitsu Nakazawa, Natsuyuki Nakanishi, Jun Nakano, Minoru Nakahara, Hiroshi Nakamura, Kohei Nawa, Tetsuya Noda, Chimei Hamada, Sakuichi Fukazawa, Ichiro Fukuzawa, Hideko Fukushima, Yoshio Fujimaki, Takashi Homma, Tojiro Maeda, Torao Makino, Taiji Matsue, Shunsuke Matsumoto, Tomio Miki, Kimiyo Mishima, Shimon Minamikawa, Aiko Miyawaki, Masanari Murai, Tomoyoshi Murayama, Yuko Mohri, Sadamasa Motonaga, Chihiro Mori, Yasumasa Morimura, Ryota Yagi, Masamu Yanase, Kenji Yanobe, Tomoe Yabe, Katsuhiro Yamaguchi, Yubisashi Sagyoin, Tadanori Yokoo, Kakujiro Yokobori, Hiroshi Den, Jiro Yoshihara, Chim↑Pom, O JUN, and others
Collection Exhibition “MOT Collection: Welcome Back / Nice to Meet You”
Venue: Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Collection Galleries 1F, 3F
Dates: March 29 (Fri) – June 16 (Sun), 2019 (Special exhibition and collection exhibition held concurrently)
Closed: Mondays (open on April 29 and May 6), May 7 (Tue)
Hours: 10:00–18:00 *Open until 20:00 on Friday, March 29
Admission: General 500 yen (400 yen) / University and vocational school students 400 yen (320 yen) / High school students, 65 and over 250 yen (200 yen) / Free for junior high students and under
*Amount in parentheses is the group rate for parties of 20 or more. *Admission is free on Friday, March 29.
Participating artists (planned)
Shunsuke Imai, Ryosuke Ogino, Yuki Okumura, Yoko Ono, Yoshio Sakagishi, Fuminao Suenaga, Naoko Sekine, Teppei Soutome, Akiko and Masako Takada, Koji Tanada, Aiko Tezuka, Yoko Terauchi, Koji Nakazono, Nadegata Instant Party (Toru Nakazaki + Daisuke Yamashiro + Tomoko Noda), Yukari Bunya, Shimon Minamikawa, Tatsuo Miyajima, Anthony Caro, Richard Deacon, Simon Fujiwara, Saleh Husein, Roy Lichtenstein, Mark Manders, Marta Pan, Sopheap Pich, Arnaldo Pomodoro, and others
