From Hara Museum ARC, Gunma
Celebrating the Season with Symbols, on view at the Kankai Pavilion since November 30, is an exhibition that showcases works with auspicious themes and motifs drawn from the Hara Rokuro Collection and centered on Japanese paintings by Maruyama Okyo, Mori Tetsuzan and Yokoyama Taikan.
Installation view
A variety of paintings and crafts are emblazoned with such symbols of good luck as the crane, Mount Fuji and the Rising Sun.
Yokoyama Taikan Seaside landscape with sunrise Meiji period (19th century)
Taikan uses a style called “moro-tai” (blurred style) which deemphasizes sumi outlines. In this composition, the viewer peers at a beach seemingly from over the ocean. The sky at sunrise tints the sky and shore a reddish tone. A bold red sun symbolizing the beginning of all things makes this picture an ideal decoration for the New Year.
Maruyama Okyo Landscape of Yodo river (detail) Edo Period (1765)
On view is the ending section of Okyo’s amazing picture scroll. Here, we notice the colors in the sky and water changing as the sun sets. The precise rendering of color caused by the change in light is one of the special things about Okyo’s work. Colors used up to that point to depict the landscape on both banks disappear and for the last three and a half meters the artist switches to sumi and gold paint.
In a different portion, Osaka Castle and the Rising Sun are depicted, filling the scene with auspicious sentiment.
We hope you will enjoy this beautiful display of aesthetic expression and form in these traditional works and the contemporary artworks that appear with them.
Featured Works
Traditional East Asian Art: Landscape of Mt. Fuji, Shiba Ko’kan, hanging scroll, Edo period / Landscape of Yodo river, Maruyama Okyo, hand scroll, Edo period / A hundred cranes Mori Tetsuzan, pair of six-fold screens, Edo period / Seaside landscape with sunrise Yokoyama Taikan, hanging scroll, Meiji period / Pair of Satsuma ware sake bottles with their portable case, Edo period / Ruyi (Buddhist ritual implement) engraved with figures, jade, Qing dynasty and others
Contemporary Art: Anish Kapoor, Void 1992 / Toshimitsu Imai, Sasameyuki 1984 / Noe Aoki, Tateyama 2007 / Hiroe Saeki, Untitled 2009
Celebrating the Season with Symbols
November 30 (Friday), 2012 – January 6 (Sunday), 2013
Kankai Pavilion (Traditional East Asian Art)
The Brilliance of the Moment – Selections from the Hara Museum Collection
September 15 (Saturday), 2012 – January 6 (Sunday), 2013
Galleries A, B and C (Contemporary Art)