ASIA WEEK

Map of the History of Science and Technology (detail), Qiu Zhijie, Chinese, b. 1969, ink on paper, dimensions variable, photo: Courtesy of the artist.

Discover two compelling new exhibitions now on view at the Seattle Art Museum! Qiu Zhijie: Map of the History of Science and Technology unfolds as a sweeping visual atlas, tracing global systems of knowledge across cultures and time. Alongside it, Samantha Yun Wall: What We Leave Behind offers an intimate exploration of memory, identity, and the traces we carry forward.

Visit soon to experience these thought-provoking exhibitions and see how past, present, and possibility intersect at SAM.

Qiu Zhijie: Map of the History of Science and Technology
January 28, 2026 – January 31, 2029
Olympic Sculpture Park
PACCAR Pavilion

For the Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park, the artist designed a Map of the History of Science and Technology. In this project, Qiu interweaves scientific and technical advancements in Asia and the West from ancient to contemporary times. The map calls out the discovery of bronze and iron, the invention of the wheel, the abacus and mathematical and scientific theorems, the plow, celadon ware, Roman cement, paper making, feats of engineering across the globe, as well as the bicycle, photography, acupuncture, the flush toilet, and more. The map traces the interconnectedness of ideas that have shaped the course of history across the globe.

To learn more, click here.

What We Leave Behind, 2025, Samantha Yun Wall, Korean/American, b. 1977, ink and conté crayon on Claybord, 60 x 84 x 2.25 in., Courtesy of the artist, © Samantha Yun Wall, photo: Mario Gallucci.

Samantha Yun Wall: What We Leave Behind
February 5 – October 4, 2026
Seattle Art Museum
Third Floor Galleries

Samantha Yun Wall’s new paintings use overlapping silhouettes of female figures as portals to unknown spaces and different temporal realms. Impetus for the new body of work is a Korean folk tale in which the Pasque flower is symbolic of a grandmother who passed away without the loving care of her grandchildren. It is a story of melancholy, loss, and remembrance. The delicate hair on the flower’s stem differentiates it, and the artist gives the plant a surreal aspect in some of her paintings, replacing the flower’s center with a watchful eye.

Yun Wall has long been interested in the personal narratives of people born to Asian women and US service members during times of military occupation in Asia. The artist is mindful of the fact that these Amerasian children are stigmatized and Black Amerasians even more so. Examining cultural taboos that perpetuate secrecy and silence, she presents her figures alternately as invisible and hypervisible in stark black and white.

To learn more, click here.

A nayika tricked by her lover’s friend, Vidushaka Nayaka; folio from the “Third” Rasamanjari. India; Himachal Pradesh, Nurpur, circa 1710–1715. Opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper. National Museum of Asian Art, Purchase and partial gift from the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection—funds provided by the Friends of the National Museum of Asian Art, S2018.1.14

Longing: Painting from the Pahari Kingdoms of the Northwest Himalayas
February 6 – June 7, 2026
Members Opening: Thursday, February 5, 5-6 pm (members only)
Curator Lecture: Thursday, February 5, 6-7pm (free with museum membership)
Sunday Sounds: Sunday, February 8, 1-2pm (free)
CAM Kids Day: Saturday, March 7, 10am-3pm (free)

The Cincinnati Museum of Art is pleased to present Longing: Painting from the Pahari Kingdoms of the Northwest Himalayas opening February 6. Featuring more than 40 works of art, the exhibition displays colorful court paintings from present-day India dating between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. These small, portable paintings were produced for royal and noble patronage by artists practicing unique artistic techniques. Influenced by the region’s culture and politics, they portray moments of leisure, religious devotion, and political positioning, and were given as gifts between regional nobility, families, and political allies. Many paintings portray devotional acts meant to connect with the divine; others depict individuals and couples who yearn for romantic dalliance; still others portray rulers and noblemen who longed to be at the center of political control. Organized around the theme of “longing,” the exhibition encourages visitors to experience art as multisensorial. Select paintings are paired with olfactory stations, touch opportunities, and musical soundscapes to heighten the work’s bhava (emotion or mood) and to encourage multiple ways to physically, intellectually, and emotionally connect with art.

Join them for a dynamic lineup of related programs, from curator-led talks to immersive experiences that pair court paintings with live music—inviting audiences to experience art as truly multisensorial.

To learn more, click here.

Hayashi Yasuo 林康夫 (b. 1928), Scenes of Namie Town Series created between 2020-2025

Memories of a House
Hayashi Yasuo Solo Exhibition
Closing Thursday, February 5, 2026
18 East 64th Street, Ste 1F

This is the last week to catch the final overseas solo exhibition of the modern ceramic master Hayashi Yasuo (b. 1928) at Dai Ichi Arts, Ltd.  A pivotal figure of Japan’s first postwar generation of ceramic artists, Hayashi helped redefine the field of contemporary Japanese ceramics. The exhibition presents an intimate selection of works spanning from 1969 to the present, tracing key moments in an extraordinary artistic practice that has unfolded over more than eight decades.

Born in Kyoto in 1928, Hayashi Yasuo was shaped by the upheavals of World War II, having been drafted as a kamikaze pilot before the war’s sudden end. In the postwar years, he engaged with leading cultural figures such as Noguchi Isamu, exhibiting with him in Paris in 1947, and co-founded Shikō-kai that same year—Kyoto’s first avant-garde sculptural ceramic movement—introducing obuje-yaki works that challenged Japan’s traditional vessel-based ceramics.

This exhibition features works from Hayashi’s early period, alongside rare examples from the 1960s and 1970s, including biomorphic forms inspired by Surrealist Max Ernst, noted for their sensuous contours and rich red surfaces. Also included are pieces from his ongoing “Memories of a House” series, reflecting his wartime night flights over Kyoto and the psychological impressions of mortality they left.

At 97, Hayashi continues to create, including his Scenes of Namie Town series, remembering the victims of the 2011 Tōhoku tsunami and reaffirming his belief in art as a vessel for humanity, memory, and history.

To view the exhibition catalog, click here.

To learn more, click here.

Detail of Fudo, 2025, madake bamboo, bamboo branches, rattan, 25 x 15 x 14 in.

Yufu Shohaku
January 30 – February 28, 2026
Opening Reception: Friday, January 30, 5-7pm
1601 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, NM

TAI Modern is pleased to present a new exhibition of works by master Japanese bamboo artist Yufu Shohaku. This exhibition features recent baskets that demonstrate the artist’s continued exploration of his signature “dragon pattern” technique and his deep engagement with Japanese mythology and natural forms.

Now in his eighties, Yufu remains one of bamboo art’s most distinctive and commanding voices. He is recognized for his bold, rough-plaited baskets created from bamboo branches, roots, and large chunks of half-split bamboo. His works are characterized by their vigorous energy, varied surfaces, and robust sculptural presence.

Yufu begins each piece with freshly cut madake bamboo, splitting and slicing the culm with a simple handheld knife to achieve strips of precise dimensions. He is among the few remaining bamboo artists who can work comfortably with bamboo strips over seven feet in length. Working largely without measurements or preliminary drawings, Yufu relies on decades of experience and an internalized sense of form. He builds his baskets through hexagonal plaiting, then adds layers of random-weave bamboo, incorporating spiraling bamboo ropes, loops of bundled bamboo strips, and his distinctive dragon pattern elements to create rich texture and visual movement.

“When I make flower baskets, I always consider the size and balance of the baskets, as well as the type of flowers to be arranged in them,” Yufu explains. “For me, baskets and flowers are inseparable, and I get my inspiration from natural forms such as the earth and cliffs. I try to give my works an organic look, as if they are a part of nature.”

To learn more, click here.

Installation view, Thomsen Gallery, Booth C6 at The Winter Show

The Winter Show
January 22 – February 1, 2026
Booth C6
Park Avenue Armory
643 Park Avenue, NYC

Congratulations to Thomsen Gallery on receiving the Outstanding Booth Design Award at The Winter Show. Visit them at Booth C6 to experience a thoughtfully curated presentation of exceptional works, from Japanese folding screens and medieval stoneware jars to contemporary porcelain sculptures, refined gold lacquer boxes, and ikebana bamboo baskets by great masters. Don’t miss it before the show closes this Sunday, February 1!

Selected by The Winter Show’s esteemed Vetting Committee and Design Council Co-Chairs, the awards celebrate the quality, scholarship, and thoughtful presentation that define the Show, as well as the expertise of the dealers who bring it to life.

To learn more about the artworks, click here.

To learn more about The Winter Show, click here.

Installation view, Through the Light: Contemporary Jogakbo by Wonju Seo

Through the Light: Contemporary Jogakbo by Wonju Seo
Closing Saturday, January 31, 2026
Charles B. Wang Center Skylight Gallery

There’s still time to experience Through the Light, the vibrant exhibition of contemporary jogakbo (Korean wrapping cloth) art of Wonju Seo at the Charles B. Wang Center before it closes January 31. Rooted in centuries-old Korean textile practices, Seo’s translucent compositions transform humble fabric into luminous abstractions. Her works echo the geometry of modernist paintings while light itself becomes an active presence—filtering through seams, shifting with space, and casting fleeting shadows.

With a refined minimalist sensibility and deep reverence for craftsmanship, Seo reimagines the once-utilitarian jogakbo as a contemporary language of transparency, balance, and spiritual reflection—inviting viewers to slow down and see light anew.

To learn more, click here.

Davide Balliano, UNTITLED_0336, 2025, plaster, gesso, acrylic, and resin on linen, diptych, overall: 96 x 80 in (243.8 x 203.2 cm)

Davide Balliano: Abacus
February 5 – March 7, 2026
Opening Reception: Thursday, February 5, 6–8pm
525 West 21st Street, NYC

Tina Kim Gallery is pleased to present Abacus, an exhibition featuring new paintings and works on paper by New York-based artist Davide Balliano (b. 1983, Turin, Italy) opening February 5. Marking Balliano’s fifth solo presentation with the gallery and a significant moment in the evolution of his practice, the exhibition will debut new paintings in color and new series of gouaches on paper.

Long defined by his monochrome palette, Balliano has for the first time introduced shades of red and ochre into his signature geometric paintings, reflecting his ongoing exploration of the tension between order and organic flux. The arches and curves that anchor his compositions, as well as the newly introduced earthy hues, explore the idea of entropic decay and the passage of time while also drawing parallels with the architectural landscape of the artist’s native Turin. The exhibition shares its title with a poem by Sandy Florian, whose meditation on how mathematical instruments can be used to present and represent (or produce and reproduce) the natural phenomena of our world served as a conceptual point of departure for this show.

They warmly invite you to join them for the opening on Thursday, February 5, and look forward to welcoming you soon!

To learn more, click here.

Kaku: Spiral Rhythm
February 5 – 28, 2026
Opening Reception: Thursday February 5, 5–8pm
35 N Moore Street, NYC

Ippodo Gallery is pleased to present Spiral Rhythm, the first solo exhibition of acclaimed Japanese artist KAKU at the gallery. More than a dozen works of paper and three-dimensional wall sculptures, composed from tens of thousands of hand-wrapped washi paper spirals, are on view from February 5 to 28, 2026. KAKU meditates on the significance of washi paper as an integral element in Japanese culture, particularly as it evokes qualities of warmth, innocence, and quiet in everyday life. The essence of washi offers a material intelligence that refreshes the soul.

KAKU (b. 1950) began the extraordinary journey into washi  in 1980s Japan when he voluntarily made the decision to withdraw from a thriving commercial career in design. The roots of what became his spiral designs developed over fifteen years of near-isolation in Budapest, Hungary as he recovered from a fast-paced culture that had created burnout: “The spiral pieces emerge from my hands as naturally as breathing, as if a spider were spinning its thread from deep within me,” the artist reflects. “The spiral feels to me like a fragment of life itself.”

To learn more, click here.