ASIA WEEK

Kiyohara Yukinobu, The Goddess Benzaiten and Her Lute (Biwa), 1660s-1680s, hanging scroll, ink, gold, and color on silk, gift of Drs. John Fong and Colin Johnstone, 2018.150

Her Brush: Japanese Women Artists from the Fong-Johnstone Collection,
Denver Art Museum
November 13, 2022-May 13, 2023

Her Brush: Japanese Women Artists from the Fong-Johnstone Collection takes a nuanced approach to questions of artistic voice, gender, and agency through more than 100 works of painting, calligraphy, and ceramics from 1600s to 1900s Japan.

Many of the artworks will be on view for the first time to the public. Her Brush traces the pathways women artists forged for themselves in their pursuit of art and explores the universal human drive of artistic expression as self-realization, while navigating cultural barriers during times marked by strict gender roles and societal regulations. These social restrictions served as both impediment and impetus to women pursuing artmaking in Japan at the time.

Her Brush showcases works by renowned artists such as Kiyohara Yukinobu 清原雪信 (1643–1682), Ōtagaki Rengetsu 太田垣蓮月 (1791–1875), and Okuhara Seiko 奥原晴湖 (1837–1913), as well as relatively unknown yet equally remarkable artists like Ōishi Junkyō 大石順教 (1888–1968), Yamamoto Shōtō 山本緗桃 (1757–1831), and Katō Seikō 加藤青湖 (fl. 1800s). These works bring forward the subjects of autonomy, legacy, and a person’s ownership of their individual story.

Interactive components facilitate a personal, intimate connection between the visitor, the artwork, and the artist. Paintings, calligraphy, and ceramic works of art are presented through the lens of the exceptional individuals behind them, with biographical focuses that tell the stories of their makers interspersed throughout the galleries.

Her Brush: New Approaches to Gender and Agency in Japanese Art
February 25, 2022, one-day symposium
This international symposium brings together foremost scholars and specialists from various disciplines in order to reflect on the state of the field—past, present, and future—reconsidering the art historical cannon through the lens of gender and agency. In this scholarly event, we aim to add to and advance the discourse on approaches and methodologies in the study, connoisseurship, and exhibition of artwork by this group of artists.

Art for Breakfast with Magnus Renfrew, Co-Founder, Tokyo Gendai,
Asia Society Japan
In person and online talk, November 15 at 8am Tokyo/November 14 at 6pm EST

It is an exciting time for the art industry in Japan as we see a positive trajectory even in times of this pandemic. Tokyo Gendai, a new international art fair will be launched in July 2023 featuring over 80 leading global galleries from Japan, Asia-Pacific, and the world. With existing art fairs in Japan, what will this new art fair mean to us and the art industry? How are the domestic galleries reacting? What effects will it have on Japanese artists who tend to be insular and for them to think out of the box?

Magnus Renfrew is the Co-Founder of Tokyo Gendai with a wealth of experience in the global art space. Particularly in Asia, he’s launched, ART HK: Hong Kong International Art Fair and Art Basel in Hong Kong, Taipei Dangdai, and ART SG to name a few. He’s made these art fairs a destination, bringing together the global art world and creating a cultural moment on the art calendar. With our friend and past speaker Eri Takane as the fair director, he has the backing of the Japan Tourism Agency, prominent local advisors, and global art leaders in the Selection Committee to make Tokyo Gendai a high point for the Tokyo art scene.

Read more, click here

Akar Prakar is presenting two exhibitions of the work of Ganesh Haloi, along with launches for their new book about the artist, Ganesh Haloi: A Rhythm Surfaces in the Mind, edited by Natasha Ginwala and Jesal Thacker and in association with Mapin Publishing.

Ganesh Haloi: A Space Left Behind
November 4, 2022-January 14, 2023
Opening Reception, November 13, 2022, 6pm
Including a Book Launch & Conversation: Jesal Thacker, Roobina Karode, and Soumik Nandy Majumdar in conversation with Ganesh Haloi

Re-citing Land | Ganesh Haloi: six decades of painting
The Jehangir Nicholson Art Foundation
Exhibition: November 11, 2022-January 11, 2023
Opening: Friday, November 11, 2022, 6:30pm
Curated by Roobina Karode, in collaboration with Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi
At the CSMVS Museum Amphitheatre, Mumbai
The exhibition opening at the Amphitheatre will be followed by the launch of a monograph and conversation with Natasha Ginwala, Roobina Karode, Jesal Thacker & Ganesh Haloi.

Ganesh Haloi (born 1936) is a Kolkata-based artist, born in Jamalpur, Mymensingh (now in Bangladesh). He moved to Calcutta in 1950, following the Partition of India. The trauma of displacement left its mark on his work, as it did on that of other painters of his generation. Since then, his art has exhibited an innate lyricism coupled with a sense of nostalgia for a lost world. In 1956, he graduated from the Government College of Art and Craft, Calcutta. In the next year, he was appointed by the Archaeological Survey of India to make copies of Ajanta murals. Seven years later, Haloi returned to Calcutta. From 1963 until his retirement, he taught at the Government College of Art and Crafts. He has been a Member of The Society of Contemporary Artists, Calcutta since 1971.

He participated in several group exhibitions in India, Documenta 14 in Athens, Greece & Kassel, Germany; Architecture of Life at Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archives in Berkeley, California; 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art in Berlin; A Special Arrow Was Shot in the Neck at David Roberts Art Foundation in London; and over the edge, crossing the line five artists from Bengal at KNMA in Delhi. He is represented by Akar Prakar Kolkata and New Delhi, and has had various solo exhibitions in Kolkata, Delhi, Mumbai, Dhaka, and New York.

Clockwise from top left: Susumu Shingu, courtesy of Ippodo Gallery; Dr. Xu Tingting and Hisao Hanafusa, courtesy of Fu Qiumeng Fine Art; Gift of Charles Lang Freer, Charles Lang Freer Papers, National Museum of Asian Art Archives, FSA_A.01_12.01.2.3, Photograph by Alvin Langdon Coburn; and A still from Miao Ying's Surplus Intelligence, courtesy of the artist, Asia Society

Asia Week New York gallery and museum specialists have been busy writing and taping informative and engaging essays and recordings that offer insights and details about Asian art currently on view. Below are just a few examples of stories well worth checking out.

Fu Qiumeng Fine Art:
Fu Qiumeng is dedicated to sharing news and in-depth information through lectures, essays, online postings, and specially curated exhibitions by emerging scholars. Most recently in the gallery's online News section, Dr. Tingting Xu, exhibition curator and Arnaldo Momigliano Postdoctoral Scholar in the Division of the Humanities at the University of Chicago, published Interview | Hisao Hanafusa: “I Do It with Nature!”. This detailed and personal exploration of the artist's history, influences, and artistic goals, replete with a variety of illustrations, sheds revealing light on his artworks now on view in the gallery. To read this informative conversation, click here.

Ippodo Gallery:
Available in Ippodo Gallery's online Journal, Ippodo staff member Jesse Gross surveys the biography, career, and art of Susumu Shingu, whose kinetic sculptures are now on view in the gallery. To read Gross's illustrated essay, Artist Retrospective: Susumu Shingu, Sculpting with Wind, which was published just yesterday, click here.

Also in Ippodo Gallery's online Journal and complementing Gross's overview is a closer look by Ippodo Director Shoko Aono at some of Susumu's large sculptural installations . Featuring several impressive photographs, this essay Kinetic Sculptor: Susumu Shingu was published last month and can be found, click here.

Asia Society:
Published in Asia Society's online Magazine and in Wired, Jennifer Conrad, Brooklyn-based writer and a recent graduate of Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, interviews artist Miao Ying in Artificial Intelligence; Real Art. Their exchange explores Miao's half-hour animated film Surplus Intelligence, on view at Asia Society New York through the end of the year, and springs into larger questions about AI and technology. To read this discussion, click here.

National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution
To assemble a world-class and comprehensive art collection requires a platoon of dealers, advisors, museum specialists, and facilitators. Charles Lang Freer, whose collection forms the foundation of the NMAA, relied on the preeminent figures of his day. Accompanying the current ongoing exhibition Freer’s Global Network: Artists, Collectors, and Dealers, the online essay Freer's Global Network investigates the specialists around the world that made Freer's storied collection possible. Particularly useful are the links to additional resources that make further deep dives possible. To read this report, click here

L-R: Fujio Yoshida (1887-1987), Flowering Kale (Habotan), 1953, woodblock print, oban tate-e
15 3/4 x 10 5/8 in. (40.1 x 27 cm.); Chizuko Yoshida (1924-2017), Butterfly B, 1953, oban tate-e
15 7/8 x 10 1/2 in. (40.3 x 26.6 cm.); and Hodaka Yoshida (1926-1995), Black Flower, 1952, woodblock print, 16 1/8 x 11 in. (41 x 28 cm.)

HODAKA YOSHIDA (1926-1995) & Yoshida Family Abstracts, Scholten Japanese Art

Scholten Japanese Art is currently offering a special presentation of works by the 20th century print artist, Hodaka Yoshida (1926-1995), accompanied by a selection of complimentary abstract prints by members of his extraordinarily talented family, including his wife, Chizuko Yoshida (1924-2017), his brother, Toshi Yoshida (1911-1995), and his mother, Fujio Yoshida (1887-1987). While this show was presented at the recent IFPDA Print Fair last week, the entire collection is still available in an Online Exhibition.

For those who expressed interest in works that have already been sold (or are on reserve), Scholten Japanese Art is currently putting together a “request list” to send to the family so they can send more impressions from Japan, if available.

For more details and for the online exhibition, click here

Annual Delaware Antiques Show, Ralph M. Chait Galleries
November 11-13, 2022
Preview: November 10, 5-9pm
Chase Center on the Riverfront
Wilmington, Delaware

Show Hours:
Preview: 5-9pm
Days of Show: 11am-6pm
(5pm on final day)

Chait Galleries will be bringing a wonderful variety of fine Chinese porcelain, works of art, and export silver. Their Booth, No. 31, is located near the center of the main exhibition room.

Read more, click here

R: Emi Anrakuji, Untitled 11, early 2000s, pigment print on an early 20th-century postcard,
5 3/8 x 3 1/2 in. (13.8 x 8.9 cm.), Series: ehagaki

Paris Photo, MIYAKO YOSHINAGA
Experimental Self-Portraits: Emi Anrakuji and Melissa Shook
Grand Palais Ephémère, Paris, November 8-13, 2022

MIYAKO YOSHINAGA introduces uniquely intimate and personal projects by two female photographers who explored their identity in self-portraitures: Emi Anrakuji and Melissa Shook.

In the early 2000s, while recovering from her long illness, Emi Anrakuji (born 1963) began taking elusive photos of herself indoors/outdoors interacting with the props which she often made by hand. She printed these self-portraits over vintage picture postcards that were collected by her grandfather, a wine importer in Tokyo, at the turn of the last century. Her grandfather, who died before she was born, traveled frequently to Europe and brought back postcards from Italy, France, the Netherlands, Great Britain, and Belgium, among other places, of ruins, buildings, and other artifacts that become the backdrops for Anrakuji's own self-portraits.

In the early 1970s, Melissa Shook (1939-2020) was a single mother with a fragmented identity as she suffered from the post-traumatic amnesia of her childhood (she lost her mother at age 12). As photography became Shook’s means of keeping her own memory intact for her own daughter, Shook made experimental daily self-portraits in her downtown New York apartment. In front of the camera, she posed clothed or naked, performed, gestured, and made faces over a period of eight months until she felt too self-conscious, and her daughter took over the project by naturally playing with the camera. Shook was a pioneer who explored the female body, motherhood, and the dynamics of interracial families in photography with her honest and inquisitive style.

Read more, click here

Chashitsu – Japanese Tea Room, Onishi Gallery
November 9-19, 2022
Tea Ceremony & Lecture: Thursday November 10, 4-5:30pm

Onishi Gallery is proud to present Chashitsu – Japanese Tea Room –a celebration of Japanese art and culture, tradition intertwining contemporary influence. This unique exhibition focuses on ceramic and metal work pieces specifically used for Japanese Tea Ceremony traditions. This exhibition will be introduced by a live Tea Ceremony and lecture by certified Tea Master Yoshitsugu Nagano on November 10th from 4-5:30 PM at Onishi Gallery. This special demonstration will bring a table-style Tea Ceremony and lecture on how to use and deeply appreciate the charm of tea ceremony related artworks and utensils created by Onishi Gallery artists.

Onishi Gallery is honored to bring the Tea Ceremony to your home through the works of our esteemed artists in metal, ceramics and glass: Hata Shunsai III (born 1976), Sako Ryuhei (born 1976), Iede Takahiro (born 1962), Hara Satoshi (born 1962), Oshiyama Motoko (born 1957) and Hagino Noriko (born 1949) working in metal; Ohi Chozaemon Toyasai X (born 1927), and Ohi Toshio Chozaemon XI (born 1958), father and son, and Itabashi Hiromi (born 1948) working in ceramics; and Noda Akiko (born 1975), working in glass.

Read more, click here.

Spring Morning in the Han Palace (detail), Qing dynasty, Kangxi reign, 1672, twelve-panel kuancai lacquer screen; black lacquer on wood core with carved and pigment and gold filled (kuancai) decoration, Gift of Charles Lang Freer, Freer Gallery of Art, F1906.42a–l

Sneak Peek—Under the Microscope: Conserving a Chinese Lacquer Screen
National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution
Online lecture, November 8, 12-12:40pm

Constructed in 1672 as a gift for Master Kong, a direct descendant of Confucius, the twelve-panel Chinese lacquer screen Spring Morning in the Han Palace had a long life before being purchased by Charles Lang Freer in 1906 and joining the National Museum of Asian Art’s collections. In this talk, objects conservator Ellen Chase will discuss various aspects of the screen as well as a recently completed, multiyear conservation project partially funded through a grant from the Bank of America Art Conservation Project. Examination and collaboration by conservators, scientists, and curators revealed multiple ways in which the vulnerabilities and subsequent degradation of the screen are directly related to how it was made and how it was displayed and stored by Freer and its previous owners. The screen will be the subject of an upcoming exhibition in July 2023.

Ellen Chase is objects conservator at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Asian Art. She received her MA in art history and conservation from New York University. Prior to joining the museum in 1999, she worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and was a fellow at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and the British Museum.

Read more and register, click here.

This month JASA offers two informative and engaging programs.

Industry and Institutions: Woodblock Prints and the Meiji Cultural Imagination
Online webinar, Tuesday, November 8, at 5 p.m. EST
Alison J. Miller, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Art History and Director of Asian Studies at the University of the South (Sewanee, Tennessee)
Dr. Miller will provide an introduction to the woodblock prints of the 1870s and 1880s with a focus on how the images worked to create and reinforce social conceptions of Meiji values and ideals.

Philadelphia Visit
In person event, Thursday, November 10, 2-4pm EST
Join this in-person visit to the new exhibition Arthur Tress and the Japanese Illustrated Book and a special presentation of selected ukiyo-e prints from collections held in the University of Pennsylvania Libraries. Professor Julie Davis will be on hand to talk with JASA members about the project, as well as to show select prints from recent gifts, including works by Kiyonaga, Utamaro, Hokusai, Hiroshige, and others. The deadline to sign up is November 8.

Note: Advance registration is required for each event, click here.