Lecture Videos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFNTjOv3vU0 Contemporary Japanese metalworking breathes life into traditional methods that have been passed down and practiced over generations. The history of Japanese metalworking evolved over two millennia, through cross-cultural exchange and internal innovation. Techniques unique to Japan flourished as metalworkers created armaments, Buddhist ornaments, and vessels used in Japanese tea practice. In this January 20, 2025, talk, Dr. Sol Jung examines examples of contemporary Japanese…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E4BIU8pKIA On December 11, 2024, JASA’s annual holiday program lecture focused on New Horizons for Japanese Art at the Princeton University Art Museum. Reopening in fall 2025 after a multi-year closure, the new Princeton University Art Museum will feature a suite of galleries devoted to the display of Asian Art. As guest speaker Dr. Kit Brooks notes, “The new museum—double the size of its previous…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpWnzMdpOgA On October 22, 204, Claudia Orenstein, Professor of Theatre at Hunter College and the Graduate Center, CUNY, presented this live webinar on bunraku, also known as ningyō jōruri, a multidimensional art that marries exquisitely carved puppet figures, operated by teams of performers, with dramatic narration to shamisen accompaniment. Drawing from early ritual practices and the work of medieval itinerant bards, in the Edo period,…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BL0HAmIT6BI On September 25, 2024,  JASA hosted a webinar with Scottish multidisciplinary artist Paul Binnie, who works in the tradition of Japanese woodblock printing, particularly shin-hanga. Paul speaks about his early training as a painter in Scotland and then as a woodblock printmaker in Japan in the 1990s. He discusses the influences on his work, the changes that have taken place and the direction his…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJq05gBFEas Since the Pacific War, Japanese architects have been producing some of the world’s most innovative homes. These are the subject of architect and journalist Naomi Pollock‘s new book, The Japanese House Since 1945. Spanning eight decades, this book presents the most compelling examples and highlights key developments in form, organization, material, architectural expression and family living. In this June 13, 2024, lecture, the author…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwtjVLoLk50 On view from April 5 through August 4, 2024, Brooklyn Museum’s exhibition of Hiroshige’s One Hundred Famous Views of Edo features new versions of the original views by the iconic Japanese artist Takashi Murakami, with photographs by Ȧlex Bueno of some of the contemporary sites of Hiroshige’s designs. This panel discussion, presented live on April 3, 2024, includes catalog author and historian Henry Smith,…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_OinWmvQ4Y As part of Asia Week 2024, JASA is presenting a special lecture, When Zen Becomes Political: Zen and Soft/Hard Power, by Frank Feltens, curator of Japanese Art at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art. Zen has been used to foster political agendas, as inspiration for activism, and as a way to go against common norms. This talk highlights distinctive moments and individuals that made Zen and…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1ZNbvROgi4 Did you know there is another JASA? The Japan-American Society of Alabama! This is only one aspect of under-known connections between Japan and the state of Alabama. In this February 7, 2024, webinar Dr. Katherine Anne Paul, Virginia and William Spencer III Curator of Asian Art at the Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama, discusses the many surprises and connections with Japanese Art in…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBR4-Z6ugVY In a time of uncertainty around the world, one singular exhibition has captured the essence of how art in Japan has marked times within its history that can offer the viewer new insights and powerful messages of hope and positive views. The show is Anxiety and Hope in Japanese Art, curated by Dr. Aaron Rio, Associate Curator of Japanese Art at The Metropolitan Museum…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiN0CiMXhhA Celebrating JASA’s 50th Anniversary, this lecture was presented by Dr. Rachel Saunders, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Curator of Asian Art at the Harvard Art Museums., on December 14, 2023. What good is art history in our era of climate catastrophe? What productive work can the study of Japanese art do in the ground between care of the planet and visual art? Researching, exhibiting, conserving, and…