Japan in Florence, land of enchantment

FLORENCE, ITALY – This coming spring 2012 Palazzo Pitti will celebrate Japan, her art, her culture, and her traditions, in the most representative rooms of its museums with three exhibitions grouped under the title, Japan. Land of Enchantment (April 3th – july 1st, 2012).

Fruit of a cultural exchange between Italy and Japan, that is between the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Artistici, Storici ed Etnoantropologici e per il Polo Museale della città di Firenze and the Japanese museum institutions, the event will be articulated in three distinct shows, each hosted in the different museums of the Palazzo.

The Museo degli Argenti will host the exhibition, About Line and Colour. Japan, her arts and her encounter with the West, dedicated to the ancient art of Japan, which can be set in a span of time that extends from the mid XVI century to the mid XIX century.

The show will trace the evolution of three-hundred years of Japanese art through works of exquisite quality. Painting, calligraphy, sculpture, lacquer ware, ceramics, metals and fabrics, in a refined kaleidoscope of “lines and colours”. The essence of a truly original aesthetics in which the simplicity and conceptual synthesis of a sample of calligraphy or a bowl for ceremonial tea, blend perfectly with the chromatic richness, profusion of gold and minuteness of detail of a folding screen from the Rinpa school or of a piece of lacquer ware. Japanese artists have had this gift. They have indeed seduced the Line, making it their own, as it dances in empty spaces and fills with joy in full spaces, though without renouncing the cultivation of colour, which captures space and imposes its rhythm.

The works exhibited will be on loan from prestigious Japanese, European and Italian museums. Among the most important works on loan from Japan are two splendid folding screens and scrolls by Sakai Hitsu, Suzuki Kiitsu, Ike no Taiga, and It Jakuch, from the Hosomi Museum of Kyoto, a vase by potter Nonomura Ninsei designated an Important Cultural Property, and costumes for Noh Theatre, belonging to the Agency for Cultural Affairs of Tokyo, the famous “Murakumo” tea bowl by Hon’ami Koetsu from the Raku Museum of Kyoto, and the series of twelve plates by Ogata Kenzan from the MOA of Shizuoka.

The Sala Bianca in the Galleria Palatina will host the excellence of modern and contemporary Japanese art in the exhibition entitled, The Elegance of Memory. Decorative Arts in Modern Japan, curated by the National Museum of Modern Art of Tokyo.

Works by the most representative artists of the Japanese decorative arts from the XIX century to the present day will be exhibited, all of which belong to three important national Japanese museum institutions, such as The Agency for Cultural Affairs, The National Museum of Modern Art of Tokyo, and the National Museum of Modern Art of Kyoto.

This exhibition purposes to illustrate how the legacy of the Japanese artistic tradition has evolved until today, giving rise to a new form of aesthetic expression.