Artists: Leiko Ikemura, Kaburagi Kiyokata, Muga Miyahara, Hamada Shōji, Yokoyama Taikan, Reijiro Wada
Although the wintry sky in Japan often appears clear and sunny, the days there also become shorter and the periods of darkness longer, some flora and fauna fall into hibernation and some regions sink under weeks of snow in silence. The presentation of pictures, woodcuts, ceramics and lacquers from the collection of the Museum of Asian Art attempts to trace this special seasonal and emotional mood. However, limited color, restrained design, and motifs that have been neglected or even overlooked do not mean a lack of anything. Rather, their quiet tones invite you to find peace and reflection and thus to draw concentrated energy.
Monochrome ink paintings of landscapes, figures from Zen Buddhism, and the full moon as a symbol of enlightenment point to a life in harmony with nature, as well as to restraint, concentration, and meditation as paths to clarity and balance. Bowls decorated with grasses or sugar cane by the ceramist Hamada Shōji (1894–1978) exemplify a design that is based on natural forms and proportions. Privately published woodblock prints (surimono) with inscriptions of poems, which were traditionally created and given as gifts at New Year, evoke the transition into a new year, which is one of the most important holidays in Japan. With the exception of two sheets, the examples presented here captivate with their reduced, sometimes abstract or geometric forms. The prints with snake and melons, on the other hand, represent the zodiac sign of the year 2025, which begins on January 29 according to the lunar calendar.
In the gallery area, which is usually used to present large-format umbrella paintings, a memento mori made of concrete and, at first glance, beautiful monochrome landscape photographs by the artist Reijiro Wada, who was born in Hiroshima in 1977 and lives and works in Berlin, are reminiscent of the harsh reality of our time. They show places of historical tragedy, such as his hometown, which was the site of a nuclear bombing in 1945, or the ash lake of the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp. A seascape by the artist Leiko Ikemura, who comes from the prefecture of Mie, turns out to be a scene of a naval battle at second glance. And in the photographs of Muga Miyahara, who was born in Tokyo in 1971, bombs and fighter planes appear in a tokonoma alcove, which is otherwise reserved for viewing art.
The paintings in the neo-traditional style of Nihonga (literally: Japan pictures), which mainly depict national Japanese motifs and are by highly renowned Japanese artists such as Yokoyama Taikan or Kaburagi Kiyokata, may appear simply beautiful. They were first presented in Berlin in 1931 in an exhibition of “Contemporary Japanese Painting” and then donated. In the same year, the Japanese military provoked an incident in Manchuria that marked the beginning of tensions on the mainland that eventually led to the Pacific War as part of the Second World War. The aspect of simultaneity is a point of reference for the exhibition “Mio Okido: remembered images, imagined history(s) – Japan, East Asia and I”, which can be seen in an adjacent exhibition room until February 3, 2025.
“Silence, Reduction and Monochrome” is a temporary presentation by the Museum for Asian Art of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin in the Humboldt Forum, Room 318, ‘Art from Japan’.
Source: Humboldt Forum (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin)
Humboldt Forum (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin)
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