Maspro Museum Nisshin

マスプロ美術館

The interesting Maspro Museum probably does not get many visitors due largely to its location in the middle of nowhere, at the Maspro factory on the north eastern side of Nagoya.

Visitors who do make the trek out to Araike Station past the Nagoya City Tram & Subway Museum and then a fair walk north will be rewarded by an outstanding collection of late Edo Period and early Meiji Period wood block prints and ukiyo-e.

Most of the prints are focused on the arrival of westerners in Japan from the 1850s onwards and their setting up in the new treaty ports of Yokohama and Kobe and can be seen as a continuation of previous Nanban Art in the early Edo period, which concentrated on the odd antics of the "southern barbarians" or nanban.

Along side this collection are exhibits of Arita ceramics from Kyushu and more local Seto and Tokoname pieces.

A third part of the museum is dedicated to the history of Maspro as a company and a display of some of its hi-tech wireless and satellite TV gadgetry.

Maspro previously sold off its $20 million collection of Picassos and Van Goghs. Christie's defeating rival auction house Sotherby's in a game of jan-ken-pon (scissors, paper, stone) for the rights to auction the paintings.

Maspro Museum
〒470-0194
Nisshin
Tel: 052 804 6666

An infrequent Kururin Bus goes past the museum which is open Monday-Friday and costs 500 yen. No photography is allowed inside.
Google map of Maspro Museum
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Elle Belle

The latest exhibition by Copenhagen-based Japanese artist Yoshiki Nakahara is Elle Belle dedicated to the beauty of women.

The painting shown below is "Danish Career Woman" aka Connie Hedegaard, the former Danish Environment Minister.

Click to enlarge

The exhibition opens Sunday 7th October 2012 in the Belle Art Gallery, Vejlevej 145 Stouby Denmark.

Ryukoku Museum Kyoto

The new Ryukoku Museum is directly opposite Nishi Honganji Temple in Kyoto and close to the Omiya campus of Ryukoku University and the famed Higurashi-mon Gate.

The Ryukoku Museum is dedicated to Buddhist art detailing the spread of Buddhist culture and belief from its birthplace in the Ganges valley in India, through South East Asia, China and Korea to Japan. The exterior of the museum features a huge blind made of ceramics.

The Ryukoku Museum has a basement level and three levels above ground in a light and airy building. The second floor concentrates on Buddhism in Asia with the third floor focusing on Buddhism in Japan.

Exhibits include sculptures from the Gandhara period of Buddhist art in what is now present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan, the Otani collection gathered between 1902 and 1914 on three expeditions sent by a chief priest of Nishi-Honganji on the original route of Buddhism from India to Japan and Important Academic Materials held by Ryukoku University.

The Buddhism in Japan section details the development of Shin Buddhism and the history of Honganji and the life of founder, Shinran Shonin.

The Ryukoku Museum also holds special exhibitions and has a museum shop and cafe facing Nishi-Honganji Temple.

Ryukoku Museum
117 Nishinakasujidori Shomen Sagaru
Shimogyo-ku
Kyoto 600-8399
Tel: 075 351 2500
Admission: 500 yen
Hours: 10am-5pm; closed Monday

Hori Art Museum Nagoya

堀美術館

The Hori Art Museum in Nagoya is on the "Cultural Path" route and is close to the Futaba Museum, the former house of actress Sadayakko Kawakami and industrialist Momosuke Fukuzawa.

The Hori Art Museum displays both western style and Japanese style 20th century art by Japanese artists. The Hori Art Museum has works by among others Migishi Setsuko (1905-1999), Fujita Tsuguharu (1886-1968), Oka Shikanosuke (1898-1978), Umemura Shoko (1902-2000), Kondo Koichiro (1884-1962) and Umehara Yuzaburo (1888-1986).

The Hori Art Museum has a modern, spacious interior which sets off the works of art well.

Hori Art Museum
4-4-2, Chikaramachi
Higashi-ku
Nagoya
Aichi
461-0018
Tel: 052 979 5717
Hours: 12.30pm-5pm; closed Monday
Admision 1,000 yen

The nearest subway station is Takaoka on the Sakuradori Line. Visitors can get a reduction of 200 yen on admission with a Do-Nichi Eco-Kippu travel card valid on Saturdays and Sundays (and the 8th of the month) on Nagoya's subway and costing only 600 yen.

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Raijin

雷神

Raijin is the Japanese god of thunder and lightening and depictions of raijin in paintings and sculpture are commonplace in classical Japanese art. Raijin is often shown with drums beating out the sounds of thunder.

In Shinto mythology raijin seems to have both positive and negative connotations: positive in the sense that thunder and lightening are often precursors of rain but negative in the sense of danger and the possibility of fire.

This image of raijin can be seen at Kenninji Temple in Kyoto. A famous sculpture of raijin along with his fellow god fujin (the god of wind) can be seen at Sanjusangendo Temple, also in Kyoto.


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