The Morikami Museum
features Bon Festival Held Every August
Bon Festival in one fun-packed evening
in August. Bon Festival is inspired by Obon,
Japan’s
traditional three-day holiday honoring ancestors and thanking them for the quality of life enjoyed
Oct. 7 05 |
Morikami
Relax and get away
from it all,
October 4 – December 31, 2005 • NEW EXHIBITION! Netsuke from the Max Lonner Collection In 18th and 19th century Japan, netsuke – miniature carvings of ivory, wood and bone – served as personal adornments for gentlemen. Today netsuke are highly sought after by collectors throughout the world who admire their delicate yet sturdy beauty. Seldom more than a couple of inches in height, these sculpted miniatures offer a compelling glimpse into the human activities, legends, flora, and fauna of Japan. The exhibition, organized by The Morikami Museum, draws principally from works assembled by Max Lonner, an avid collector of netsuke who lived in Palm Beach County (Florida). Netsuke constitute a form of Japanese artistic expression that is widely recognized outside of Japan yet is virtually unknown in Japan itself. Worldwide museum visitors and collectors alike are drawn to these miniature works of art by which carvers of almost uncanny ability coax exquisite three-dimensional detail from their material on such a remarkably minute scale. October 4 – December 31, 2005 • NEW EXHIBITION! Made in Japan: The Postwar Creative Print Movement Prints, specifically woodblock prints, are a major form of Japanese artistic expression that, like netsuke, is well known outside of Japan. The prints that came to be known as ukiyo-e, or 'pictures of the floating world,' dominated Japanese art in the 18th and 19th centuries and also created a sensation in Europe and North America. In the 20th century, sosaku hanga – 'creative woodblock prints' – continued to spark a lively artistic dialogue between East and West. This exhibition, organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum, presents 70 works by the best artists of Japan's creative print movement whose aesthetic traditions interacted with American artistic trends in the 1950s and '60s.
The exhibition examines a major movement of modern art in Japan during a time when printmakers rather than painters or sculptors took the lead in introducing contemporary Japanese art to American audiences. It is the first major show of its kind in many decades and is being limited to two venues only, the Milwaukee Art Museum and The Morikami. November 9 • Wednesday – Adventures in Collecting Netsuke This lecture will coincide with the Netsuke exhibition currently on display at The Morikami. Cost: Members, $5; (Non-members, $7); Optional dinner $18. For tickets, call 561-495-0233, x225 Time: 6:00pm for dinner, 7:30pm for the lecture Speaker: Dr. Joseph Kurstin Location: The Morikami Theatre Continued…Dr. Kurstin will speak about the fun and exciting world of collecting netsuke. This avid collector will show us how to appreciate these delicate miniature carvings, which depict the legend, flora and fauna of Japan. He will tell us when they were used and how they progressed during the centuries. Dr. Kurstin will display fine images of netsuke treasures from his own collection in a PowerPoint presentation. January 10 – March 19, 2006 • NEW EXHIBITION! The Faithful Samurai: Woodblock Prints by Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797 - 1861) On a snowy night in December, 1703, in a brazen act of vengeance that immediately caught the public's attention, forty-seven retainers of the disgraced lord Asano Naganori attacked the mansion of their lord's enemy, Kira Yoshinaka. The event struck a deep emotional chord in the heart of Japanese society resulting in a steady stream of theatrical performances, books and woodblock prints. More than a century later, the renowned Utagawa Kuniyoshi created a series of prints depicting the major players in the drama. Organized by Exhibits USA, this exhibition presents fifty-seven of Kuniyoshi's print designs of the 1830s and '40s devoted to the dramatic incident. In addition, swords, costumes and other artifacts will be on display.
The Morikami is the first venue on a national tour for this exhibition focusing on an incident of Japanese history that continues to resonate among the Japanese people and through the art it has inspired. Due to the shear volume of images created reflecting the event, many museums and private collectors own prints depicting what is referred to in English as the story of the forty-seven ronin. This is the first time that a comprehensive exhibition of these images has been organized.
January 18 • Wednesday – The Ronin Prints: Art, Artifacts, Truth and Fiction Speaker: Mr. David Pepper Cost: Members, $5 (Non-members, $7); Optional dinner, $18. For tickets, call 561-495-0233, x225. Location: The Morikami Theatre Time: 6:00pm for dinner, 7:30pm for the lecture This lecture will coincide with the exhibition currently on display at The Morikami. In a personal view of the story which has captivated Japanese and foreigners alike for three centuries, Mr. Pepper will discuss various aspects of the tale of the 47 Ronin, particularly as they relate to Kuniyoshi’s imaginative woodblock prints. Using color slides, he will explore the weapons, costume and other artifacts illustrated by this 19th-century artist, comparing them with actual examples. A particular focus will be on Kuniyoshi’s interpretation of events which occurred almost a century before he was born.
April 1-30, 2006 • NEW EXHIBITION! Prints From The Morikami's Collection Woodblock prints constitute an art form that is closely associated with Japan. This exhibition, drawing from The Morikami's collection, features woodblock and other Japanese prints from the middle of the 19th to the end of the 20th century. Included are ukiyo-e prints featuring kabuki actors, beauties and landscapes at the end of Japan's feudal period; triptychs portraying the brave new world of Meiji Japan during the late 19th century push to modernize; images of the centuries-old noh theater from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, surprisingly the first time this dramatic form became the subject matter of prints; landscapes by masters of the early 20th century shin-hanga movement that updated and energized the subject matter of 19th century ukiyo-e; prints depicting orchids privately commissioned in the early 1940s to document a wealthy Japanese industrialist's extensive botanical collection; and etchings, serigraphs and other examples of post-woodblock print media created by Japanese artists since the early 1970s.
May 1 – 31, 2005 Japanese Design Today 100 – NEW EXHIBITION! In recent decades Japanese industrial designers have become widely respected and recognized around the world. This exhibition, organized by the Japan Foundation, promises to be tremendously exciting as it features innovative, contemporary product designs by Japanese industrial designers for the 21st century including furniture, electronic house wares, lighting, functional office accessories, tableware and toys. The show, featuring designs that continue to evolve, inspire and excite, also includes a number of historical product designs for comparison. The Morikami is one of the first venues for a worldwide tour over the next several years for this exhibition.
June 13 to September 17
• NEW EXHIBITION!
Utilizing artifacts drawn largely from The Morikami's own collection, the exhibition examines a slice of daily life in Japan not often considered, but one that lends its own unique imagery to Japanese art and design.
October 3 to December 31 2006 • Tuesday – NEW EXHIBITION! Paintings from the Collection of Mrs. Marilynn Alsdorf Collection Exhibit The collection of Marilynn Alsdorf is known internationally for the extraordinary breadth of its holdings that include art from so many different cultural traditions it is hard to know where to begin listing them. Among the works in her collection is a rare and important group of Japanese paintings that show the same kind of eclecticism, ranging in date from the 12th century to the 19th century. This show includes early Japanese Buddhist paintings as well as works by such highly regarded artists as Sesson Shukei (16th century), Hon’ami Koetsu and Tawaraya Sotatsu (late 16th century), Kano Tan’yu (17th century), Hakuin Ekaku (17th to 18th century), Sakai Hoitsu (18th to 19th century), and Shibata Zeshin (19th century).
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