January 5, 2015, 6:30–8:30pm
Japan Society Gallery
333 East 47th Street
New York, NY 10017
Gallery hours: Tuesday–Thursday, 11am–6pm,
Friday, 11am–9pm, Saturday and Sunday, 11am–5pm.
Admission is free Friday 6–9pm
T +1 212 832 1155
Session 3 with Dr. Reiko Tomii
Monday, January 5, 6:30–8:30pm
Dr. Reiko Tomii is an art historian; independent curator; co-founder of PoNJA-GenKon, a group of scholars, curators and researchers interested in the study of contemporary Japanese art; and an author of numerous publications and curatorial experiences including Tate Modern’s 2001 exhibition Century City: Art and Culture in the Modern Metropolis and Radicalism in the Wilderness: International Contemporaneity and 1960s Art in Japan, a book-length study she is completing this spring.
The PoNJA seminar series is organized in conjunction with the exhibition Garden of Unearthly Delights: Works by Ikeda, Tenmyouya & teamLab at the Japan Society Gallery through January 11, 2015.
The exhibition features intricate allegorical paintings, installation, and digital works on view were created by three artistic visionaries shaping Japanese art and culture today: Manabu Ikeda, Hisashi Tenmyouya, and the art and technology collective teamLab. Each tackles urgent cultural and social issues in a manner informed by today’s spectacle and information overload. But each also harkens back to the Japanese tradition of the master craftsmen, takumi, in the level of technical precision and detail they bring to the creation of complex, bravura fantasies.
Garden of Unearthly Delights comprises 25 works of art. To help viewers navigate the array of allusions in these densely layered works of art, the exhibition also features contextual works, ranging from ephemera, including an ’80s paperback edition of Nausicaä in the Valley of the Wind, the Japanese post-apocalyptic fantasy illustrated by Hayao Miyazaki, to master ukiyo-e prints and a hanging scroll painting by the 18th-century artist Itō Jakuchū.
Exhibition-related programming for Garden of Unearthly Delights is assisted by American Chai Trust, Cindy and Howard Rachofsky, and David Teiger.
Arts & Culture Lecture Programs are made possible by funding from the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Endowment Fund.
Press contact
Shannon Jowett: [email protected] / T +1 212 715 1205
For catalogue purchases, please contact Cory Campbell, [email protected] / T +1 212 715 1223