Corfu Museum of Asian Art Opens New Japanese Galleries | Greece

The Corfu Museum of Asian Art, Greece, an ASEMUS member, has recently introduced seven new galleries dedicated to Japanese arts and cultures. The exhibition includes the display of objects long-held in the collection as well as a selection of materials only recently donated. The tour begins with exhibits from the prehistoric period (13,500 BC-552 AD) followed by the introduction to Buddhism. Other galleries, including 'The Way of Tea', the Art of Noh and Kyogen theatre, the life of a geisha and the power of Samurai warriors during the Edo period (1600-1868), allow visitors to explore and gain a better understanding of the rise and development of Japanese arts and cultures. The Corfu Museum of Asian Art's collection of Japanese art consists of about 6,200 items. The bulk of the collection comes from the Manos bequest (1927) and Hatzivassiliou bequest (1974), with others coming from more recent donations. The Museum's collection covers all periods of Japanese art as the origins of Japanese culture reach as far as the 6th century AD, while its continuation includes contemporary works of art, such as ceramics, which are made in the traditional manner by famous artists, known as living national treasures. The art of Japanese painting is presented through works from the Hatzivassiliou and Manos collections. The objects, folding screens, scroll paintings, calligraphy scrolls, and ukiyo-e woodcuts, date from 17th to the 19th century. The collection includes one of the few surviving paintings of Sharaku and a copy of the school Kano school screens that adorned Nijo Castle. Their great artistic importance resulted in their being exhibited, together with other items from the Museum, in the Edo-Tokyo Museum in 2009 and in Paris at the Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris in 2011. In addition to this permanent collection, two temporary exhibitions of Japanese art can currently be visited at the Corfu Museum of Asian Art:

• "Ghosts and Spirits. The Supernatural in Japanese ukiyo-e prints", which will be shown until 31 July 2015; and
• "Drama and Desire in Japanese Art", which can be visted until 31 October 2015.

For additional information about the Corfu Museum of Asian Art's Japanese Art Collections, please visit http://www.matk.gr/en/collections/japanese-art-collection/general-description/ For additional information about the museum, please visit http://www.matk.gr/en/   Pictured: Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849), ‘South Wind, Clear Sky’, from the series ‘Thirty – Six Views of Mount Fuji’, end of Bunsei (1818-30) to early Tempo era (1830-44); and Matsumoto Kōshirō IV as Kakogawa Honzō and Matsumoto Yosenaburō as Konami, Kansei era (1795), fan painting