EXHIBI­TIONS

MOMAT COLLECTION

Founded in 1952, the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, is home to more than 14,000 works by Japanese and international artists. The collection display traces the arc of modern and contemporary art in Japan from the 19th century to the present through some 200 works presented across 12 galleries, each with its own specific theme. Highlights of the current display include Yoshitomo Nara’s Harmless Kitty (1994), presented at the museum for the first time in two years, and Eikoh Hosoe’s landmark photographic series Ordeal by Roses (1961), created in collaboration with the celebrated author Yukio Mishima. (The latter work is presented in commemoration of Hosoe’s passing in 2024 and the centennial of Mishima’s birth this year.) New acquisitions will also be on view.

NATIONAL MUSEUM OF MODERN ART, TOKYO

The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, is Japan’s first national art museum, founded in 1952. MOMAT’s collection of more than 13,000 artworks, dating from the end of the 19th century to the present, provides an authoritative overview of the development of modern and contemporary art in Japan and beyond. Highlights include important works by early modernist painter Ryusei Kishida, formative works by On Kawara and Yayoi Kusama, and new media art by contemporary artists Koki Tanaka and Chikako Yamashiro. International movements, from Minimalism and Land art to feminist video, are also represented in the collection.

From its inception MOMAT has been the site of historic exhibitions, such as 1953’s “Abstraction and Surrealism,” which highlighted Japanese practitioners of nonfigurative painting, and “August 1970: Aspects of New Japanese Art,” which helped define the emerging Mono-ha art movement. The museum now features an annual program of substantive solo and thematic exhibitions. Recent shows include a survey of the 20th-century Mingei movement and a retrospective of multimedia artist Shinro Ohtake.

Dining options on-site.