Winter–Spring 2012
The following is an archive of past Japanese Art Society of America lectures and special events. Go to JASA Programs for our most current schedule.
January • February • March • April • May • September • October • November • December
January
Tuesday, January 17, 6 p.m.
The Marymount School1026 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York
Hokusai Surimono in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New Discoveries
Lecture by John Carpenter, Curator of Japanese Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Reception follows.
February
Saturday, February 11; in two sections 11 a.m.–12:30 p.m. or 2–3:30 p.m.
New York, New YorkHalsey and Alice North Collection of Contemporary Japanese Sculptural Ceramics
The twelve artists Alice and Halsey have chosen as the focus of this JASA visit are among the leading creative forces in contemporary Japanese sculptural ceramics. They range from senior pioneers active since the start of the sculptural movement in the 1950s to emerging talents. Each in his or her own way has departed from tradition with innovative ideas, creative forms, new glazes, remarkable textures, and inventive building and firing techniques.
March
Sunday, March 18, 12:15 p.m.
The Marymount School1026 Fifth Avenue (between 83rd and 84th Streets)
New York, New York
Annual Meeting and Panel Discussion
Annual meeting and special panel discussion on the popular subject of Deco Japan: Shaping Modern Culture, 1920-1945, on view at the Japan Society from March 16 to June 10, with noted scholar and exhibition curator, Kendall H. Brown, Ph.D., Professor at California State University at Long Beach, and Robert Levenson, collector. Moderator: Emily Sano, Former Director, Asian Art Museum of San Francisco and JASA board member.
Monday, March 19, 3–4:30 p.m.
New York, New Yorkvisit to a private collection
Visit to the Kurt Gitter and Alice Yelen Collection (for 30 members who missed last year’s visit).
March 31–April 1
Washington, DCJakuchu in Washington, D.C.
Special two-day visit includes a tour guided by Yukio Lippit, Ph.D., Professor of Japanese Art, Harvard University, of the extraordinary exhibition Jakuchu’s Colorful Realm of Living Beings (33 scrolls), loaned by the Japanese Imperial Household Agency at the National Gallery of Art from late March to late Apri to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the gift of the cherry trees to Washington, D.C. We will also view the Textile Museum’s Woven Treasures of Japan’s Tawaraya Workshop and two exhibitions at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery: Hokusai’s complete series, Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji and Masters of Mercy: the Buddha’s Amazing Disciples, a selection of paintings from the complete set of 500 Arhats by Kano Kazunobu, with Freer-Sackler curators. Other private-collection visits are planned.
April
March 31–April 1
Washington, DCJakuchu in Washington, D.C.
Special two-day visit includes a tour guided by Yukio Lippit, Ph.D., Professor of Japanese Art, Harvard University, of the extraordinary exhibition Jakuchu’s Colorful Realm of Living Beings (33 scrolls), loaned by the Japanese Imperial Household Agency at the National Gallery of Art from late March to late Apri to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the gift of the cherry trees to Washington, D.C. We will also view the Textile Museum’s Woven Treasures of Japan’s Tawaraya Workshop and two exhibitions at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery: Hokusai’s complete series, Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji and Masters of Mercy: the Buddha’s Amazing Disciples, a selection of paintings from the complete set of 500 Arhats by Kano Kazunobu, with Freer-Sackler curators. Other private-collection visits are planned.
May
Friday, May 11, 2–4 p.m., or Saturday, May 12, 2–4 p.m.
New York, New YorkPrivate Collection Visit
New York, New York
Board member and Secretary-Treasurer Judy Blum will show selections from her collection of ukiyo-e prints. Space is limited to 20 members per session.
September
Wednesday, September 12, 6 p.m.
The Marymount School1026 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York
A Vexing Problem: The Long Tradition of Copies and Forgeries in Japanese Art
Patricia Graham will present a lecture focusing on the widespread production of copies and fakery in Japanese art, drawing on her experience as both a scholar and Asian art appraiser. Her talk will explore copies by Japanese artists of the past and the present, of originals from Japan, China, Kore, and even the U.S.A.—sometimes made for legitimate reasons and sometimes made with the intention to deceive. Her talk will point out that because old, fraudulent copies remain in circulation in the art market today, infamous schemes of long ago should not be forgotten, and how the use of scientific tests can facilitate detection of fakery.
Patricia Graham received her Ph.D. in Japanese art from the University of Kansas. A former museum curator and university professor, she is now a certified appraiser and consultant on Asian art. Research fellowships from the Asian Art Council, Fulbright, and NEH, and elsewhere have funded her many publications, which include two books, Tea of the Sages: The Art of Sencha (1998) and Faith and Power in Japanese Buddhist Art, 1600–2005 (2007). Her current projects include a book to be published by Tuttle, Design in Japanese Arts: Culture, Craft, and Aesthetics, and another on contemporary Japanese Buddhist-inspired artists.
Saturday, September 29, 1–4 p.m.
Japan Society333 East 47th Street
New York, New York
Silver Wind Symposium
Symposium in conjunction with the exhibition Silver Wind: The Arts of Sakai Hōitsu (September 29, 2012 – January 6, 2013) will discuss the beauty of Japanese nature as depicted by Sakai Hōitsu. The event includes distinguished speakers Tadashi Kobayashi, former Professor of Art History at Gakushūin University, Tokyo; Satoko Tamamushi, Professor of Art History at Tokyo’s Musashino University of Fine Arts and a leading authority on the art of Sakai Hōitsu; and Haruo Shirane, Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature and Culture, Columbia University. The exhibition, curated by Matthew McKelway, Takeo and Itsuko Atsumi Associate Professor of Japanese Art History at Columbia University, focuses on paintings by Sakai Hōitsu and Kiitsu in American collections. Special reduced fee for JASA Members.
October
Monday, October 15, 6 p.m.
The Marymount School1026 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York
Frederick Starr
Henry D. Smith II, Professor Emeritus of Japanese History at Columbia University, will present a lecture on Frederick Starr: An American Anthropologist and his Collector Friends in Japan.
Frederick Starr (1856-1933) was an anthropologist from the University of Chicago who visited Japan many times in the 1910s and 1920s, falling in with networks of Japanese antiquarian collectors and developing a special interest in the collection of Japanese folk toys and the “senjafuda” paper placards still seen posted at many Japanese temples and shrines. He helps us to understand a type of collecting that was rooted in a nostalgia for Edo culture and still lives on today.
Henry D. Smith II has recently written widely about the revenge of the Forty-Seven Ronin (“Chushingura”), and is now working on topics in the history of modern Kyoto, and on Japanese collecting practices in the prewar period.
Tuesday, October 30, 6 p.m.
THIS EVENT HAS BEEN POSTPONED DUE TO SEVERE WEATHER, BUT WILL BE RESCHEDULED.
The Marymount School1026 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York
The New Golden Age of Japanese Ceramics
Noted dealer Joan B. Mirviss will present The New Golden Age of Japanese Ceramics: 1950 to the Present, an illustrated lecture in honor of Dr. Frederick Baekeland and his contribution to the study and collecting of contemporary Japanese ceramics.
In the post WWII era, Japan emerged from the ashes of battle to once again begin an ascent to ceramic greatness that has come to inspire the world with three generations of claymasters in what is arguably a New Golden Age that far exceeds the accomplishments of the Momoyama era.
This lecture will start with the mingei (folk-art) tradition personified by Hamada Shôji followed by the avant-garde Sôdeisha movement led by Yagi Kazuo, the giants of modern functional ceramics to the rise of the next generation of creative masters and teachers such as Akiyama Yô and Fukami Sueharu. In tandem with this, the talk will also explore the critical role played by Frederick Baekeland and other westerners in first recognizing, and then promoting and exhibiting the work of these groundbreaking artists.
Joan B. Mirviss is an expert and leading dealer in Japanese art, specializing in modern and contemporary ceramics, ukiyo-e prints and paintings. Ms. Mirviss received her M.A. in Japanese art history from Columbia University, has curated several museum exhibitions, authored numerous books and articles on various aspects of Japanese art, and has lectured widely at museums and universities in the United States and Japan.
November
Tuesday, November 13, 3 p.m.
The Metropolitan Museum of ArtJapanese Galleries
1000 Fifth Avenue (at 82nd Street)
New York, New York
Private gallery tour
Dr. John Carpenter, Curator of Japanese Art, will guide JASA members through the exhibit Designing Nature: The Rinpa Aesthetic in Japanese Art (May 26, 2012–January 13, 2013). Participation requires museum admission plus a $9 fee paid to JASA.
December
Friday, December 7, 5 p.m.
Japan Society 333 East 47th Street New York, New YorkSilver Wind: The Arts of Sakai Hōitsu Exhibition Tour (Rescheduled)
Special private gallery tour of the exhibition Silver Wind: The Arts of Sakai Hōitsu by exhibition curator Matthew McKelway, Takeo and Itsuko Atsumi Associate Professor of Japanese Art at Columbia University. Guests will need to pay Japan Society admission. Limited to 25 JASA members.
Tuesday, December 11, 6 p.m.
The New York UniversityInstitute of Fine Arts
1 East 78th Street
New York, New York
Ashura’s Face
Special guest lecturer Yukio Lippit, Professor of History of Art and Architecture at Harvard University, will present Ashura’s Face, exploring the meaning of the 8th-century enigmatic three-headed Buddhist sculpture from Kofukuji Temple in Nara. Holiday party reception follows.
Saturday and Sunday, December 14 and 15
San Diego, CaliforniaWest Coast Members Event
Special weekend excursion to San Diego for California and national members, including visits to two special exhibitions of contemporary Japanese ceramics and woodblock prints at the Mingei International Museum and the San Diego Museum of Art’s newly installed Asian Art galleries, as well as the Japanese garden in Balboa Park. Organized by Susan Peters, Wilson Grabill, and private collector and member Gordon Brodfuehrer.