Japan Society Announces Exhibition Celebrating The 16th-Century Master's Paintings As Never Before Seen In The U.S.

Continuing the celebration of Japan Society's 110th anniversary, Japan Society Gallery is pleased to announce the spring 2018 exhibition A Giant Leap: The Transformation of Hasegawa To?haku, commemorating the life and artistic legacy of Hasegawa To?haku (1539-1610), one of Japan's most beloved painters, artistic innovators and founder of the 16th-century Hasegawa school of painting. For the first time in a New York City venue, visitors will have an unparalleled opportunity to experience more than ten of To?haku's most celebrated works in a single space, including four Important Cultural Properties from Japanese collections.

A Giant Leap will convey the dramatic transformation of a painter from the provinces into one of Japan's most important and beloved artists. The exhibition will take as its point of departure a little known but extremely important screen by To?haku, currently in a private U.S. collection, which depicts birds, trees, and striated rocks emerging from breaks in expansive gilt clouds. Current scholarly research has identified this masterpiece with the pivotal moment in the artist's career, marked by a radical change in his painting style and echoed by a transformation in his nomenclature from "Nobuharu" to "T?haku". Owing to their rarity and in order to preserve their remarkable condition, the screens and scroll paintings will be displayed in two rotations, March 9-April 8, 2018 and April 12-May 6, 2018.

A Giant Leap will not only call attention to To?haku's achievements by focusing on his artistic transformation, but the exhibition will also raise critical questions about his ambition as a contemporary artist in early modern Japanese society from a historical perspective. Within a centuries-old tradition of artistic training, how was Nobuharu/To?haku able to refashion his style so dramatically over the course of his career? By viewing the exhibited masterworks from this vantage point, A Giant Leap will offer a platform for considering Japan's transition into the Early Modern period, as expressed in the visual arts.

"We are thrilled to stage this momentous exhibition of rare works by Hasegawa To?haku. In many ways, the exhibition exemplifies Japan Society's unique capability to provide a window onto Eastern scholarship, acquiring Important Cultural Properties from Japan and presenting them in a single exhibition in New York City. As many of the loans are previously unseen in the West, A Giant Leap is an opportunity for To?haku's genius to be recognized at an international level that has not yet been achieved in the U.S.," said Yukie Kamiya, director of Japan Society Gallery.

To?haku has been the subject of renewed attention in recent years, including at the Kyoto National Museum and the Tokyo National Museum, where the 400th anniversary of the artist's death was commemorated in an important 2010 survey exhibition. Raised in a family of cloth-dyers in Nanao, on the Sea of Japan coast in the Hokuriku region of Japan's main island, T?haku began his career as a provincial painter of Buddhist paintings, working under the name "Nobuharu". He later moved to Kyoto, the heart of late 16th-century Japanese politics and culture, where he studied Chinese and Japanese painting and accepted instruction from Kan? Sh?ei, head of the Kan? school, which supplied paintings to Japan's leading samurai. In the 1580s, he appears to have begun using the name "T?haku," a switch in nomenclature that coincided with a shift in his style.

While producing painted screens covered in vast expanses of gold leaf, T?haku also began to demonstrate a mastery of sumi-e (ink painting) at this stage in his career. By 1590, he had emerged as the leading painter of his day, founding his own school of painting-the Hasegawa school-consisting primarily of his own sons. T?haku became the favored painter for Sen no Rykyu and the powerful daimy? Toyotomi Hideyoshi and, at the turn of the 17th-century, he was summoned to the new capital of Edo by Hideyoshi's successor, Tokugawa Ieyasu (founder of Tokugawa shogunate), where he remained briefly until his death.

The exhibition is conceived and supervised by Dr. Miyeko Murase (Professor Emerita, Art History and Archaeology Department, Columbia University and former special consultant for Japanese Art, Asia Department, The Metropolitan Museum of Art) with Dr. Masatomo Kawai (professor emeritus, Keio University and director, Chiba City Museum of Art) in consultation with Yukie Kamiya, director of Japan Society Gallery.

In conjunction with this exhibition, a 96-page cagalogue with full-color reproductions will be published by Japan Society. Essays will be contributed by Dr. Miyeko Murase and Dr. Masatomo Kawai and entries by Masato Matsushima (curator, Tokyo National Museum), Professor Matthew McKelway (Columbia University), and Hiroyoshi Tazawa (chief curator, Tokyo National Museum).

ABOUT JAPAN SOCIETY

Since 1971, Japan Society Gallery has been the premier institution in the United States for the display and interpretation of Japanese art and culture. Through groundbreaking exhibitions and related programs, the Gallery cultivates a broader understanding and appreciation of Japan's contributions to global artistic heritage; explores the artistic interconnections Japan shares with its Asian neighbors, the U.S., Latin America, and Europe; and celebrates the diversity of Japanese visual expression from prehistoric times to the present day.

Founded in 1907, Japan Society in New York City presents sophisticated, topical and accessible experiences of Japanese art and culture, and facilitates the exchange of ideas, knowledge and innovation between the U.S. and Japan. More than 200 events annually encompass world-class exhibitions, dynamic classical and cutting-edge contemporary performing arts, film premieres and retrospectives, workshops and demonstrations, tastings, family activities, language classes, and a range of high-profile talks and expert panels that present open, critical dialogue on issues of vital importance to the U.S., Japan and East Asia.

During the 2017-18 season, Japan Society celebrates its 110th anniversary with expanded programming that builds toward a richer, more globally interconnected 21st century: groundbreaking creativity in the visual and performing arts, unique access to business insiders and cultural influencers, and critical focus on social and educational innovation, illuminating our world beyond borders.

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