Korean Landscapes of Homeland and Longing - A Commemorative Exhibition for the 80th Anniversary of Korea's Liberation @ MMCA Deoksugung, Seoul

A Commemorative Exhibition for the 80th Anniversary of Korea's Liberation 

Landscapes of Homeland and Longing 

MMCA Deoksugung, Seoul

14 August – 9 November 2025

Chun Hyucklim 

Landscape of Tongyeong, 1992

Oil paint on canvas, 130×160cm

Tongyeong City Hall

Nam Kwan 

Refugees, 1957 

Oil paint on canvas, 160.5×130.5cm 

Private collection

Kim Junghyun 

Landscape, 1940s

Ink and color on paper, 168×94cm (×2) 

Bookook Cultural Foundation

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea (MMCA), presents A Commemorative Exhibition for the 80th Anniversary of Liberation: Landscapes of Homeland and Longing at MMCA Deoksugung.

Through modern and contemporary Korean landscape paintings, poetry, and Manchurian exile Gasa poetry, this exhibition explores the sentiment of “hometown” that has remained deeply rooted in Korean consciousness throughout the turbulent tides of Japanese colonial rule and liberation, division and war, and the subsequent waves of industrialization and urbanization.

In reflecting on the 80-year history since liberation, the concept of 'hometown' serves as a key link between this land and its people. In Korean literature and art, the “hometown” is depicted as homeland, motherland, paradise, or an object of eternal yearning. During the Japanese colonial period it symbolized a nation lost, it became the land of nostalgia after national division, and it transformed into a fading landscape during the era of industrialization. Nostalgia for home has been an enduring emotional thread running through the country’s turbulent modern history, serving as a source of inspiration in both modern and contemporary art and literature.

The exhibition is centered around four themes: homeland, affection for home, displacement from home, and longing for home. It presents an opportunity to reflect on the meaning of Korean land through modern and contemporary landscape paintings that portray the loss and rediscovery of territory during the Japanese colonial period, the separation and dispersal caused by division and war, survival amid ruins, and the hope of reconstruction. In particular, this exhibition sheds light on the diverse layers of modern and contemporary art by uncovering and showcasing works that have long been kept in museum storage, private collections, or the homes of artists' families—such as regional landscapes and pieces by local artists that have rarely been seen in the mainstream art world.

Lee Insung 

Untitled, 1930s-1940s 

Ink and color on paper, 47×36cm 

Private collection

Part 1, “Homeland: The Stolen Fields,” examines perspectives of Korean land in the imperialist era through landscape paintings that depict the country’s various regions during the Japanese colonial period. During this period, the concept of homeland was shaped by Japan’s colonial perspective, which portrayed Joseon as an idyllic and pure countryside using the style of “local color” paintings. These works were simultaneously in vogue and at the center of controversy. Other artists, however, such as Oh Chiho and Kim Jukyung of the Nokhyanghoe (Green Hometown Association) in Gyeongseong, endeavored to express the true nature of Joseon through rich variations of light and color by recognizing “hometown” as a space that inspires national sentiment and seeking to discover the unique colors inherent in the Korean land. In addition, landscape paintings by artists from regional groups such as Hyangtohoe in Daegu, Chungwanghoe in Busan, Yeonjinhoe in Gwangju, and the art communities of Jeju and Honam region reflect the distinct climates and sceneries of their respective areas. This section presents works that reflect the complex perspectives surrounding Korean land during the Japanese colonial period, alongside powerful verses by resistance poet Yi Sang-hwa; nostalgic poems by other Korean poets including Jeong Ji-yong, Baek Seok, Lee Yong-ak, and Oh Jang-hwan; and Manchurian exile Gasa poetry written by independence activists in Manchuria, which have been inscribed in UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register. By presenting these materials alongside artworks, the exhibition seeks to explore shared expressions of the sense of 'hometown' embedded in the cultural and artistic consciousness of the time.

Heo Geon 

Cultural Landscape, 1945 

Ink and color on paper, 56×48cm

Private collection

Lee Sangbeom 

Returning at Dawn, 1945 

Ink on paper, 129×256cm 

Private collection

Yoo Youngkuk 

Mountain, 1984 

Oil paint on canvas, 97.5×130cm

MMCA Lee Kun-hee Collection

Part 2, “Affection for Home: A Land Reclaimed,” explores how hometown emerged as a significant motif in the works of artists following Korea’s liberation. These pieces reflect experimentation aimed at conveying the vivid spirit of the country’s climate, terrain, and natural environment, along with efforts to incorporate traditional materials, colors, and aesthetic sensibilities. Featured artists include Son Ilbong, who returned to his hometown of Gyeongju after teaching in Japan and created numerous landscape paintings; Moon Shin, who returned to Korea immediately after liberation from studying in Japan and captured the vibrant energy of the sea off the coast of his native Masan; Lee Ungno, an artist known for his innovative approach to modern ink painting who explored diverse formal expressions in ink to capture the landscapes of his hometown Hongseong and its surrounding regions during the pre- and post-liberation periods; Kim Whanki, who forged a uniquely Korean modernism, inspired by the blue islands, skies, and moonlit seas of his native Anjwado Island in Sinan; and Yoo Youngkuk , who developed a uniquely Korean mode of abstraction through his persistent exploration of the mountainous forms of his hometown Uljin. Chun Hyucklim, who discovered a unique artistic language in the landscapes of his hometown Tongyeong, and Byun Shiji, who found his artistic identity in his native Jeju. These artist’ works highlight how hometown served as a powerful artistic inspiration. In this section, in particular, highlights how the artistic roots of well-known painters such as Kim Whanki, Yoo Youngkuk, and Lee Ungno can be traced back to their hometowns, offering insight into a crucial turning point in the transition from modern to contemporary art in Korea.

Kim Won 

Title unknown, 1954

Oil paint on canvas, 102×177.7cm 

MMCA

Byeon Gwansik 

Spring in Muchang, 1955

Ink and color on paper, 181×357cm 

MMCA Lee Kun-hee Collection

Shin Youngheon 

Suffering, year unknown

Oil paint on canvas, 35×25cm 

Private collection

Part 3, “Displaced from Home: A Land Ruined,” examines depictions of Korean land as perceived and recorded by artists amidst the nation-wide tragedy of the Korean War. The City After the War (1950) by Lee Chongmoo and Demonlished (1953) by To Sangbong portray devastated urban landscapes with a sense of desolation and quiet melancholy. Abstract and semi-abstract landscapes such as Shin Youngheon’s Tragedy (1958), Lee Soo-auck’s 6.25 War (1954), and Nam Kwan’s Refugees (1957) express the horrors of war and the memory of suffering through dark colors, rough brushstrokes, and a fragmentation and deconstruction of form. Meanwhile, Lee Manik’s Cheonggyecheon (1964) and Chun Huahuan’s The Left Behind By War, (1964), painted from a realist perspective, vividly and intensely depict the bleak reality of the era, portraying the poverty and despair of refugee settlements during the war. Artists of this period reflected on their wartime experiences to confront trauma and terror while seeking to transform and overcome them through artistic creation. Rather than depicting tragedy directly, the expression reveals the inner emotions of people reflected in the landscapes, allowing viewers to interpret these historical landscape paintings from multiple perspectives.

Yoon Jungsik

Spring, 1975

Oil paint on canvas, 41×53cm

MMCA

Choi Youngrim

Spring Garden, 1982 

Oil paint and soil on canvas, 127×191cm

Seoul Museum

Kim Jonghwi

Hometown Nostalgia, 1987

Oil paint on canvas, 97×194.5cm 

MMCA

Part 4, “Longing for Home: A Land of Nostalgia,” features works by artists who explored their own artistic worlds grounded in longing and the pain of displacement and separation due to war and the ensuing national division. These artists included motifs in their work that evoke the lyrical sentiment of their native regions and depicted their hometowns as ideal paradises to soothe their yearning. Works such as Yoon Jungsik’s Spring (1975), Park Sungwhan’s Nostalgia (1971), and Choi Youngrim’s Spring Garden (1982), which present utopian visions of hometowns in the face of losing both family and hometown while enduring loneliness, isolation, poverty, and sorrow, pose a fundamental question: what does art leave behind and what purpose did it serve in an era of such loss and deprivation? During this period, artists who shared the experience of displacement came together to organize the 1952 Wolnam Artists’ Exhibition, followed by the founding of the Creative Art Association in 1957 and the Exhibition of Gusangjeon in 1967, through which they sought to explore a shared artistic direction grounded in the sentiment of longing.

Kim Sunghee, director of the MMCA, notes, “This exhibition commemorates the 80th anniversary of Korea’s liberation by retracing the emotional resonance of hometown that has remained in our hearts throughout the country’s modernization, industrialization, and urbanization, as expressed through landscape painting. I hope it offers visitors a sincere experience of the perspectives held by these artists who captured the spirit of their times and their homeland.”

MMCA Deoksugung - National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art

99 Sejong-daero (Jeong-dong), Jung-gu, Seoul 04519

www.mmca.go.kr

The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea @ Baltimore Museum of Art

The Way of Nature

Art from Japan, China, and Korea

Baltimore Museum of Art

September 21, 2025 - March 8, 2026

The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) presents The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea, which draws on the museum’s extensive holdings to consider the importance of nature in East Asian cultures. The exhibition features more than 40 objects, from magnificent ink drawings to beautifully crafted stoneware and poignant contemporary photographs and prints. Collectively, the works reflect on nature as a vital source of creative inspiration and spiritual connection and consider human existence within the complexity of the vast natural world across centuries and into the present day. The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea is part of the BMA’s Turn Again to the Earth initiative, which explores the relationships between art and the environment.

“The Way of Nature offers an insightful look at the intertwining roots of artistic expression and the experience of the natural world through vibrant works from the BMA’s Asian art collection. It’s an exciting opportunity to see objects on view for the first time, or in a long time, through a lens that is both accessible and meaningful, as many of us seek connection through and to nature,” said Asma Naeem, the BMA’s Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director. “As the BMA focuses on expanding its collection with the work of artists from around the globe, we are excited to continue to share more of our holdings, and the stories they contain, with our community.”

The Way of Nature is organized around four overarching themes that engage with elemental aspects of the natural world and human intervention within it. The exhibition opens with a section that examines depictions, interpretations, and connections to the qualities of air, water, and stone. Among the highlights is a handmade Fireman's Coat (hikeshi banten) with Hawk and Waves (Japan, early- to mid-20th century) by an unidentified artist. The intricately sewn object depicts a hawk soaring above turbulent waves, suggesting that the firefighter who chose the design sought the protective powers of water, strength, and keen vision. During a fire, the beautiful imagery would have been worn on the interior, only to be revealed once the fire was extinguished. The section also includes works such as the evocative ink drawing Water and Mountain Landscape (China, 1955) by the artist Huang Junbi and the densely decorated wood and jade sculpture Miniature Mountain with Longevity Motifs (China, late 18th - early 19th century) by an unidentified artist. 

The second section explores the significance of the changing seasons as visual indicators of nature’s transformative power, whether in the experience of wild terrain or in meticulously tended gardens. Across East Asia, emblems of the seasons, such as plums for the spring and chrysanthemums for the fall, are both often shared within communities and widely referenced in art. A case in this section includes a range of objects featuring plum blossoms, such as the hanging scroll Plum Branch and Full Moon (Japan, 1905-1915) by Kamisaka Sekka and the stoneware Bowl Decorated with Plum Branch and Crescent Moon (China, 13th century) by an unidentified artist. The section also includes a stunning Buddhist Priest's Robe (Kesa) in Karaori with Floral Designs (Japan, 1750-1868) by an unidentified artist.

The Way of Nature continues with works that capture human intrusion into the natural realm, as artists reveal humanity’s environmental impact through both imagery of calamitous events and in more subtle and ambiguous scenes. In his series Between Mountains and Water (2014–2017), Chinese artist Zhang Kechun examined the effects of human activities on the landscape in Zhangjiajie National Forest Park, while Japanese artist Leiko Shiga documented the aftermath of Japan’s 2011 earthquake and tsunami in the poignant photo series Rasen Kaigan. The exhibition concludes with consideration of the spiritual transcendence that can be found in nature. This final section is anchored by the eight-panel screen Ten Symbols of Long Life (Korea, mid- to late 19th century) by an unidentified artist. The complex screen incorporates eight separate paintings to convey a wish for longevity, as embodied through such symbols as cranes, bamboo, water, and sun.

The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea is curated by Frances Klapthor, BMA Associate Curator of Asian Art.

BMA - BALTIMORE ART MUSEUM 

10 Art Museum Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218

artbma.org

Claes Oldenburg @ Pace Gallery, Tokyo - "いろいろ / This & That" Exhibition

Claes Oldenburg 

いろいろ / This & That

Pace Gallery, Tokyo

July 17 – August 23, 2025

Claes Oldenburg 

Geometric Mouse--Scale B, 1970-72 

© Claes Oldenburg, courtesy Pace Gallery

Claes Oldenburg

Miniature Soft Drum Set, 1969 

© Claes Oldenburg, courtesy Pace Gallery 

Pace presents This & That, an exhibition of work by American artist CLAES OLDENBURG, at its Tokyo gallery. Bringing together sculptures and prints that exist in series created by the artist between the 1960s and mid 2000s, this lively survey showcases the importance of multiplicity in Oldenburg’s practice, inviting visitors to immerse in the artist’s madcap world and uncover resonances and touchpoints to Japanese culture. Curated by Pace CEO Marc Glimcher and Maartje Oldenburg—daughter of Claes Oldenburg and his wife and longtime collaborator Coosje van Bruggen, and head of the artists’ estates—the exhibition is organized as part of the gallery’s 65th anniversary year celebration. It is also be Pace’s first major presentation of Oldenburg’s work since the gallery announced its global representation of the Claes Oldenburg estate, the Coosje van Bruggen estate, and the Oldenburg and van Bruggen estate, continuing its commitment to sharing the intertwining legacies and individual achievements of the two artists with its global

audience. 

The Japanese title of the gallery’s presentation is いろいろ (“Iroiro”), which roughly translates to “various,” “variety,” or “miscellany.” Suggesting a mixed-bag or a hodgepodge, “Iroiro” can also be written as 色々, which comprises a repetition of the Kanji character 色 (“Iro”). “Iro” literally means “color,” but it typically refers to the color or hue of things. It can also suggest an object’s general appearance, and even more metaphorically, can refer to the sensuality of a thing (as in the occasional English usage of the word “colorful”). “Iroiro” thus echoes Oldenburg’s almost passionate involvement with banal objects, the way he lovingly coaxed a vast array of ordinary, miscellaneous things from their humdrum existence in the normal course of life—the "this and that”—into subject-matter for serious artistic inquiry.

In a broad sense, Pace’s show sheds light on Oldenburg’s fascination with multiplicity, the act of artistic reproduction, and the mutability of imagery. Widely known for the monumental artworks he realized around the world with Coosje van Bruggen, he also created many domestically sized objects across a wide variety of media throughout his career. “The multiple object,” he once said, “was for me the sculptor’s solution to making a print.”

This exhibition in Tokyo is the first major presentation of Oldenburg’s work in the Japanese capital since 1996. The artist’s only other solo show in the city took place in 1973 at Minami Gallery. Notably, he debuted his large-scale Giant Ice Bag (1970) sculpture, which is animated by mechanical and hydraulic components, in the US Pavilion at Expo 70 in Osaka. Since 1995, Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen’s large-scale sculpture Saw, Sawing has been on public view outside the Tokyo International Exhibition Center. Oldenburg’s sculptures Inverted Q (1977–88) and Tube Supported by Its Contents (1983) can be found in the collections of the Yokohama Museum of Art and the Utsunomiya Museum of Art, respectively.

Claes Oldenburg—who presented his first solo exhibition with Pace in 1964—was a leading voice of the Pop Art movement who, over the course of more than six decades, redefined the history of art with his sculptures, drawings, and colossal public monuments that transform everyday objects into idiosyncratic entities. He rose to prominence in New York in the late 1950s and early 1960s, when he was among the artists staging Happenings—a hybrid art form incorporating installation, performance, and other mediums—on the city’s Lower East Side. Collaborative and ephemeral, these environments included The Street (1960) and The Store (1961)—his first solo presentation with Pace featured works from The Store. Following his work with props in these Happenings, Claes Oldenburg began creating his iconic soft sculptures, which charted new frontiers in the medium, upending its traditional contents, forms, and materials.

Claes Oldenburg and Pace’s Founder and Chairman Arne Glimcher maintained a friendship for 60 years, working closely from the early years of the artist’s career up until his death in 2022. Since the 1960s, Pace has presented Oldenburg’s work in some 30 exhibitions and produced seven catalogues dedicated to his practice. The gallery also supported Oldenburg and van Bruggen’s creation of the large-scale sculptures Typewriter Eraser, Scale X (1998-99), which is part of the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., Balzac Pétanque (2002), which is in the collection of the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, and Floating Peel (2002) at the Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, among many other projects.

Claes Oldenburg

N.Y.C. Pretzel, 1994 

© Claes Oldenburg, courtesy Pace Gallery

Among the works in the gallery’s Tokyo show are some 60 multiples of Oldenburg’s painted cardboard sculpture N.Y.C. Pretzel (1994)—these works will be presented in a vending machine vitrine near the entrance of the gallery space. Other multiples in the exhibition include the artist’s cast plaster Wedding Souvenir (1966), his painted aluminium and brass Profiterole (1989–90), and his sewn canvas Mouse Bags (2007–17), all of which speak to his engagement with the quotidian, from the food we eat to pop cultural icons like Mickey Mouse.

In the way of larger-scale sculpture, This & That features Tied Trumpet (2004), a knotted bright yellow trumpet rendered in aluminum, plastic tubing, canvas, felt, and foam, and Miniature Soft Drum Set (1969), a set of nine sewn screen-printed elements on canvas. Another highlight is Knife Ship 1:12 (2008), an aluminum and mahogany wood reprisal of the monumental Knife Ship that Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen presented as part of their legendary 1985 performance Il Corso del Coltello (The Corse of the Knife) in Venice, Italy—this storied, site-specific project, realized by the artists in collaboration with curator Germano Celant and architect Frank Gehry, centered around a boat in the shape of a Swiss-army knife, which was floated down the city’s canals.

Claes Oldenburg 

Alphabet in Form of a Good Humor Bar, 1970 

© Claes Oldenburg, courtesy Pace Gallery

A 1976 screenprint of the Knife Ship superimposed onto the image of the Guggenheim Museum in New York—an artwork that predates the performance—is also be included in This & That. Other prints on view at Pace in Tokyo will be Alphabet in Form of a Good Humor Bar (1970), which renders the alphabet in the shape of an ice cream bar; The Letter Q as Beach House, with Sailboat (1972), where Claes Oldenburg imagines the letter ‘Q’ as a towering waterfront home; and the artist’s Apple Core prints, each representative of one of the four seasons, from 1990.

Through his iterative and elastic process of translating imagery from one medium to another—and suggesting innumerable possible transformations as part of that process—Claes Oldenburg expanded the possibilities of art by inviting the viewer to look again. Taken together, the works in this exhibition reflect his uncanny ability to render the familiar strange, and to imbue magic and wonder into the most mundane of subject matter.

Maartje Oldenburg is the daughter of Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen and is the head of the artists’ estates. A writer, editor, and lawyer, Maartje Oldenburg formally studied Japanese language, literature, and history for many years. She lived and worked in Japan in the 1990s.

Claes Oldenburg (b. 1929, Stockholm; d. 2022, New York) is renowned for his sculptures, drawings, and colossal monuments that transform familiar objects into states that imply animation and sometimes revolt. A leading voice of the Pop art movement, Oldenburg came to prominence in the New York art scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s. His seminal installations The Street (1960) and The Store (1961) launched his career, subverting artistic and institutional conventions while creating a backdrop for happenings and performances under the production name Ray Gun Theater. Initially conceiving of monumental works based on everyday items in drawings and collages, Claes Oldenburg installed his first realized outdoor public sculpture, Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks (1969–74), during an antiwar protest at Yale University in 1969. He subsequently collaborated for over three decades with Coosje van Bruggen to create largescale projects across the world. Conflating notions of art and banality, and high-brow and low-brow, the investigation of objecthood spans Oldenburg’s earliest production to his work today.

PACE GALLERY TOKYO

1F; Azabudai Hills Garden Plaza-A

5-8-1 Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo

www.pacegallery.com

Ceci N’est Pas Une Guerre - This Is Not A War - Exhibition Curated by Do Tuong Linh Eli @ Klein Gallery, New York

Ceci N’est Pas Une Guerre - This Is Not A War

Curated by Do Tuong Linh

Eli Klein Gallery, New York

Through August 23, 2025

Bui Cong Khanh

Porcelain Medals, 2018

140 hand painted porcelain medals

Courtesy of Eli Klein Gallery

© Bui Cong Khanh

Ca Le Thang

Beneath Deep Rivers, Field Submerged No. 3, 2024

Oil, acrylic, and mixed media on canvas

39 3/8 x 67 inches  (100 x 170 cm)

Courtesy of the artist, Salon Wiking, and Eli Klein Gallery 

© Ca Le Thang

Nguyen Phuong Linh

Allergy, 2004

6kg of nails on underwears

Courtesy of Eli Klein Gallery

© Nguyen Phuong Linh

Eli Klein Gallery presents “Ceci N’est Pas Une Guerre - This Is Not A War,” a group exhibition of 17 Vietnamese artists showcasing 24 works. Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War, the exhibition seeks to challenge the long-standing tendency to confine Vietnamese contemporary art within narrow narratives of war, trauma, and survival. Audiences are invited to move beyond inherited narratives and experience the breadth, complexity, and vitality of Vietnamese contemporary art today: unbound, unpredictable, and charged with energy.

Artists: Bui Cong Khanh, Bui Thanh Tam, Ca Le Thang, Doan Van Toi, My-Lan Hoang-Thuy, Le Hoang Bich Phuong, Oanh Phi Phi, Nguyen Phuong Linh, Anh Thuy Nguyen, Xuân-Lam Nguyen, Ha Ninh Pham, Pham Tuan Tu, Arlette Quynh-Anh Tran, Tran Luong, Truong Tan, Van Khanh, Minh Dung Vu

The exhibition prompts a reconsideration of how Vietnamese visual culture is presented within a global context. While artists have engaged deeply with the past fifty years of history after the War, their works have often been interpreted through the lens of the aftermath. Within the context of Vietnam's massive economic reforms, the artists critically explore themes of identity, censorship, and queerness. The exhibition focuses on a younger generation of artists who reflect on materiality, memory, and mythology, reimagining self and culture beyond the burden of historical trauma. The exhibition also highlights Vietnamese artists living abroad, particularly in America, France and Germany, whose works address themes of displacement, cultural hybridity, and artistic innovation. Curated by Do Tuong Linh, the show brings together the voices that challenge the notion of “Vietnamese art” as a singular concept, creating a layered dialogue that is poetic and political, introspective and globally engaged.

Emerging in the aftermath of the Vietnam War and the implementation of the widespread generation of influential artists responded to history, memory, and the shifting boundaries of identity and expression in deeply personal and resonant ways. Ca Le Thang’s compositionally poetic painting serves as a quiet footnote to the natural and spiritual landscapes of southern Vietnam, expressing a deep emotional connection to his homeland’s nature and history. Through humor and symbolism, Tran Luong retells a traditional Vietnamese legend in a gently narrated yet subtly subversive manner, reflecting the sociopolitical tensions and transformations of early 21st-century Vietnam.

Truong Tan, who was considered the first openly gay artist from Vietnam, creates work that is both emblematic and groundbreaking in its exploration of social norms and marginalized identities. Blending historical research with conceptual art not taught in Vietnam’s educational system, Bui Cong Khanh playfully, yet critically, challenges official reward systems by combining porcelain military insignias from multiple nations to question the authority behind medals. Vietnamese lacquer serves as the core medium in Oanh Phi Phi’s practice, through which she explores the transmission of memory, reflections on image theory, and experimental possibilities in scale and technique. Bui Thanh Tam blends the delicate spirit of Vietnamese folk traditions with the bold allure of pop and consumer culture, creating works that are at once challenging, seductive, and provocative.

Building on this historical trajectory, a younger cohort turned toward material experimentation, ironic language, and cross-disciplinary methods to address contemporary social issues, incisively engaging with gender, politics, and cultural memory amid Vietnam’s rapid transformation. Pham Tuan Tu combines elements of primitivism and humor in his work, using refined craftsmanship and a diverse range of materials to delve into the complexities of contemporary society. Nguyen Phuong Linh weaves personal memories into broader cultural contexts, skillfully transforming found objects and materials to reveal the vulnerability of being a woman in Vietnamese society.

Merging political themes with sci-fi aesthetics, Arlette Quynh-Anh Tran constructs nonlinear and absurd narratives of modern history, challenging dominant post–Cold War frameworks surrounding the Global South. Doan Van Toi and Le Hoang Bich Phuong both explore the contemporary rhythms of traditional media. Toi weaves digital pixels into silk and textiles to reflect on the intricate relationship between humans and nature, while Phuong employs delicate silk to blend surrealism with quiet subversion, questioning gender, eccentricity, and societal norms.

Artistic practice continues to expand into the intersections of new media, speculative narratives, and digital processes, reimagining and reconstructing tradition and identity. Vietnamese art now charts a future-oriented sensibility, forging new dialogues and connections between personal experience and global context. My-Lan Hoang-Thuy redefines the relationship between artist and medium, using acrylic drips as a “canvas” to merge painting with personal photography, creating a visual language where intimacy, spontaneity, and imagination intersect. Ha Ninh Pham explores the construction of territories and perception through drawing and sculpture, creating imagined worlds shaped by his unique logic and underlying sense of skepticism. By sewing dyed silk onto canvas, Minh Dung Vu initiates a dialogue between material surface and visual texture, investigating materiality, light, shadow, and perception.

Xuân-Lam Nguyen brings forgotten Vietnamese folk art into contemporary relevance, focusing on Indochinese Orientalist photography and displaced cultural artifacts, blending autobiographical elements with queer identity to construct glitchy, alternative narratives that offer a dynamic commentary on the intersections of identity and history. Anh Thuy Nguyen’s sculptural works explore the relationship between emotional states and the human body. Through digitizing and transforming everyday Vietnamese domestic objects, Van Khanh creates faux-fiber replicas that exist between physical reality and digital dreamscape, reimagining traditions and mythologies within trans narratives.

About the Curator Do Tuong Linh 

Do Tuong Linh is a curator based in Hanoi (Vietnam) and New York City (United States). Linh holds a BA in Art History and theoretical criticism from Vietnam University of Fine Arts, and a MA in Contemporary Art and Art Theory of Asia and Africa, at SOAS (University of London) UK with the prestigious Alphawood scholarship. She is a part of Bard Curatorial Studies program class of 2025 and was part of the curatorial team of 12th Berlin Biennial.

Linh has engaged in various art exhibitions and projects in Southeast Asia, Europe and beyond since 2005. She participated in international arts programs such as Le 18 Curator In Residency 2024, Asia Cultural Council Research Fellowship 2023, Ljubljana Graphic Art Biennial 2019, Slovenia; Association of Art Museum Curators conference, New York, USA; Mekong Cultural Hub 2018 – 2019, Taiwan; CIMAM International Museum Workshop 2018, Oslo, Norway; Asia Culture Center (Gwangju, Korea) 2018; Tate Intensive 2018, Tate Modern Museum, UK; French Encounter at Art Basel in Hong Kong 2018. Some of her notable curated exhibitions include Who is Weaving the Sky Net (Singapore), Means of Production 2024 (New York City, USA), Revived Photo Hanoi 2023 (Hanoi, Vietnam), Berlin Biennial 2022 (Berlin, Germany), Citizen Earth 2020 (Hanoi, Vietnam), The Foliage 3 (VCCA, Vincom Center for Contemporary Arts, Hanoi, Vietnam) 2019, Geo-Resilience of the All-world at La Colonie (Paris, France) 2018, the No War, No Vietnam exhibition at Galerie Nord (Berlin, Germany) 2018, and SEAcurrents (London, UK) 2017.

ELI KLEIN GALLERY

398 West Street, New York, NY 10014

www.galleryek.com

Ceci N’est Pas Une Guerre - This Is Not A War

Eli Klein Gallery, New York, May 23 - August 23, 2025

Thomas Demand @ Taipei Fine Arts Museum - "The Stutter of History" Retrospective Exhibition

Thomas Demand 

The Stutter of History

Taipei Fine Arts Museum

January 18 — May 11, 2025

THOMAS DEMAND 

The Stutter of History - Exhibition Poster

「托瑪斯．德曼：歷史的結舌」展覽主視覺。

Courtesy of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum

“I guess the core of it is making the world into a model by redoing it and stripping off the anecdotal part, that’s when it becomes an allegory, and the project becomes a metaphor. Making models is a cultural technique—without it we would be blind.”

—Thomas Demand

The retrospective of celebrated German artist Thomas Demand is on view at Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM). The exhibition is co-organized by the Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography, the UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, and TFAM, curated by Douglas Fogle. It brings together nearly 70 of the artist's works from the 1990s to the present, showcasing his 30-year practice at the intersection of sculpture and photography.

Born in Munich in 1964, Thomas Demand studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich and the Düsseldorf Academy of Fine Arts from 1987 to 1992, and earned a master's degree in fine arts from Goldsmiths, University of London, in 1994. Initially, Thomas Demand simply created sculptures with paper and cardboard, while photography originally served as a means to document his works. During the shooting process, he discovered the differences between the physical objects and their flat images captured by the camera lens, leading him to develop a method of constructing objects for the purpose of being photographed. This has subsequently become the primary medium for presenting his creations. Demand reconstructs life-size scenes of seemingly banal images from the mass media using paper and cardboard, and then photograph the scenes to create images similar to the originals. Finally, he destroys the models, leaving behind only large-format photographic prints. In this way, he questions the notion of photography as an absolutely objective or truthful medium and explores the distance between reality and representation. Demand's works have been exhibited in major museums and galleries worldwide. He represented Germany at the 26th São Paulo Biennial (2004), and appeared four times at the Venice Architecture Biennale. In light of his love for models and architecture, it is not surprising that Demand has collaborated over the years with various well-known international architects such as David Chipperfield, Rem Koolhaas, and SANAA, on projects ranging from exhibitions and installations to actual architectural building projects.

The topics of Demand's works often come from news photos of notable historical or social incidents, recreating key moments that have influenced Western or even global situations. His early works address moments of German history that he never personally experienced but learned about through images, such as the bomb-damaged room where Hitler narrowly escaped assassination in 1944 (Raum / Room, 1994), and the film archives of the Nazi-supported filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl (Archiv / Archive, 1995). Additionally, Thomas Demand has reconstructed scenes of major world news events, such as the stack of documents at Donald Trump's press conference before his inauguration as U.S. President in 2017 to prove that he had relinquished control of his businesses (Folders, 2017), the hotel room where the fugitive American National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden originally stayed in Russia (Refuge Series, 2021), the storeroom of the Wildenstein Institute, where 30 paintings and sculptures that had been missing for decades were recovered during a police raid (Vault, 2012), and the abandoned control room of the Fukushima nuclear power plant in the aftermath of Japan’s 2011 Tōhoku earthquake (Kontrollraum / Control Room, 2011).

Throughout his career, Thomas Demand has been interested in our culture’s production and interpretation of “nature,” as well as the division between the artificial and natural worlds. Using over 270,000 paper leaves, he created Clearing (2003), an idyllic forest scene with sunlight streaming through the canopy, reflecting people's unfounded romantic vision of a pure and pristine nature. His work Grotte / Grotto (2006) was made with 36 tons of cardboard. The artist gathered and studied hundreds of postcards of caves sold in gift shops worldwide and built a life-sized grotto with stalactites accumulated over thousands of years. The final photographic version of Grotto becomes an ideal condensation of our collective impression of a cave. This is the only model among Demand's works that has been preserved and is currently on view at the Prada Foundation in Milan. The wall-covering photographic wallpaper work Hanami (2014), which has been installed across the entrance walls of the TFAM’s exhibition galleries, provides viewers with an immersive experience. By recreating countless cherry blossoms out of paper, Demand invites us to contemplate on the fleeting and cyclical nature of life through their ephemeral bloom.

In 2008, Thomas Demand moved from the monumental to personal and quotidian subjects, creating his Dailies series. The artist still employed the same creative methods, transforming images into paper sculptures and then photographing them. However, this series of images came from mobile phone snapshots of banal scenes he encountered daily, such as an empty yogurt cup with a pink plastic spoon left on a shelf, a bar of soap placed on the edge of a sink, a pile of letters spilling out from under a door, and cups inserted into the holes of a chain link fence. The Dailies series is Demand's attempt at creating an autobiographical narrative using ordinary visual elements, and celebrates the subtle and infinite charm of life's minutiae. These works condense his understanding of history: history is not only composed of grand events worldwide but also includes the mundane matters of our individual lives. In light of the popularization of phone-based photographic technology and our culture’s now obsessive sharing of images on social media, the artist's painstaking reproduction of these poetic if unremarkable moments from his own life in his Dailies also asks us to reflect on the outsized importance that these rapidly produced and disseminated images have taken on in contemporary society.

Thomas Demand has also used stop-motion animation in his work to explore the world of moving images. In Pacific Sun (2012), the artist recreated a piece of surveillance camera footage that went viral on the internet depicting a few moments inside a cruise ship cabin as it was hit by rogue waves from a tropical storm off the coast of New Zealand. In this film we see tables, chairs, lockers, paper plates, computer monitors, and other objects slide back and forth whimsically and erratically. Thomas Demand spent months meticulously recreating these chaotic moments frame by frame with paper and cardboard. In Balloons (2018), a string of balloons tied to a red plastic clothespin drifts slowly across a concrete and brick sidewalk, moved lazily by the wind. Only the clothespin and colorful ribbons are visible on the screen, while the balloons themselves float outside the frame, their looming presence marked only by the shadows cast on the ground, moving gracefully as if dancing to an improvised minuet. Accompanied by swaying tree shadows and occasionally by fallen leaves on the ground, the work captures poetic moments of urban life that are often overlooked and incidental.

In 2011, during his residency at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, Thomas Demand began his Model Studies series. Departing from his technique of sculpturally reconstructing existing images of the world, he turned his lens directly on the preparatory paper models of architects and designers, capturing abstract and fragmented elements within them. Whether it was the provisional maquettes of John Lautner, one of the most influential modernist architects in 20th-century America, those created by contemporary architectural firms like SANAA, or the radical paper dress patterns of the fashion designer Azzedine Alaïa, who was famous for his sculptural designs, these images reveal that the world around us is constructed on a foundation of paper. During his exploration of building environments in the visual world, Demand began using his photographic prints as wallpaper to intervene in white cube spaces, adding a spatial depth to the exhibition of his photographic works, as seen in Cones (2018) and Lockers (2018), which fill the walls of two rooms of the exhibition.

Through the ingenious use of paper as a material and the arrangement of light and shadow, Demand's works initially appear similar to documentary images of the real world, but upon closer inspection, reveal themselves to be recreations using paper and cardboard. Based on flat documentary images, Thomas Demand carefully re-construct these scenes out of paper before photographing the models and finally destroying them. Through layers of reproduction and translation between his source images and their final quasi-photographic counterparts, Demand’s ghostly works suggest that even though history lurks in our collective and individual memories in the form of images, there is always a gap in our perception of the so-called truth. Demand's work explores how the fragile texture of paper can become the carrier of images and memories, whether from our daily lives or the larger arc of world historical events. This aspect of Demand’s work highlights the tension between photographic images and the real world while questioning both the inertia of image culture and the paradox of perception.

THOMAS DEMAND (b. 1964, Munich, lives and works in Berlin) attended both the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and the Düsseldorf Art Academy from 1987 to 1992 before receiving a master’s degree in fine arts from Goldsmiths’ College in London in 1994. Thomas Demand has shown his work at major museums and galleries worldwide. His solo projects include exhibitions at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (2024); Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume (2023); UCCA Center for Contemporary Art (2022); Centro Botin, Santander (2021); Garage, Moscow (2021); M Museum, Leuven (2020); Fondazione Prada, Venice (2017, 2007); Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth (2016); Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2014, 2015); DHC Art Center, Montréal (2013); National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2012); the Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2012); Kaldor Public Arts Project #25, Sydney (2012); Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam (2010); Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin (2009); Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna (2009); the Serpentine Gallery, London (2006); the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2005); the Kunsthaus Bregenz (2004); and a survey at Fondation Cartier, Paris (2001). He also represented Germany at the 26th Sao Paulo Biennale (2004). His widely acclaimed exhibition “The Boat is Leaking. The Captain Lied.,” a collaboration with the filmmaker Alexander Kluge and the stage and costume designer Anna Viebrock, was on view at Fondazione Prada in Venice in 2017. His work has been included in four iterations of the Venice Architecture Biennale and was recently featured at the 2nd Chicago Architecture Biennale. His work is represented in numerous museum collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Centre Pompidou, Paris; and Tate Modern, London. Thomas Demand has also curated several shows, including “L’Image Volée” at Fondazione Prada (Milan, 2016); “Model Studies” (Graham Foundation, Chicago, 2013); “La carte d’après nature” (Nouveau Musée National de Monaco, Monaco, (2010); and a contribution to the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale, “Common Ground” (2012)

TAPEI FINE ARTS MUSEUM — TFAM

No.181, Sec. 3, Zhongshan N. Rd., Zhongshan Dist., Taipei City 104227

www.tfam.museum

Marion Paquette, Shikichi Osamu, Shoji Asami @ Tokyo Arts and Space - ACT 2025 - Artists Contemporary TOKAS - 7th Edition - "Plural Body/ies" Exhibition

ACT 2025 - Artists Contemporary TOKAS - 7th Edition - Marion Paquette, Shikichi Osamu, Shoji Asami

Plural Body/ies 

複数形の身体 

Tokyo Arts and Space Hongo

22 February - 23 March 2025

― Examining contemporary society based on the plurality of the body/ies

It is said that, of the approximately 8 billion people that inhabit the earth today, we get in contact with a total of about 30,000 – or 0.000375% of the earth’s population – in our lifetime. When imagining all the people on the planet that we don’t and will never know, we realize the immense scale of human existence, that exceeds by far what we can grasp with our own bodily senses. This exhibition is themed around the plurality of the human body, which is also what the creative work of the three featured artists – Marion PAQUETTE, SHIKICHI Osamu, SHOJI Asami is derived from. The body that transforms through relationships with others; the body that is multiplied in the virtual space; or human society as one collective body – these are some of the various positions from which visitors are invited to explore the properties and possibilities of the “body” in the present age.

Our body is built to functions as an organ by which we perceive the world around us. Every single one of us is a subject that generates communication, recognizes the people around, and builds relationships with them.

But why is it that human existence comes with not only one, but multiple “bodies”? One thing that facilitates the plural nature of the body, are its reproductive functions. A human is always born from multiple other bodies, and for about 200,000 years since Homo sapiens is said to have emerged, history unfurled as a string of countless interactions between one human body and another.

At the same time, advanced medical technology has enabled us to extract such individual human body parts as organs or blood, and transplant them into the bodies of people in need of those specific parts. In other words, it is possible to manipulate living bodies to integrate parts of multiple bodies of other human beings. The pervasion of digital technologies in everyday life promoted the virtual multiplication of individual bodies, whereas images of avatars or bodies modified using apps, for example, assume multiple identities through various aspects on levels other than physical reality .

This exhibition focusing on the plural existence(s) of (the) human body/ies, features works by Marion Paquette, Shikichi Osamu,and Shoji Asami, three artists who examine in their respective works the mutual bodily relationships between human individuals. Considering his dance as a form of communication at a stage prior to verbal formulation, Shikichi pursues ways of transferring and internalizing sensations generated through interactions between individuals, into other bodies. Shoji translates the worlds that she explores with her body into painted spaces, to create works that viewers are to experience in a way as if moving back and forth between their own and the artist’s body. Paquette’s creations are collective structures that incorporate human individuals in coexistence and interaction with each other, constructing spaces where the boundaries between private and public are blurred. Each focusing on the delicate relationships between individual bodies that continue to affect one another, the three artists create works that project the plural nature of the human body, remind us of the imaginative faculty and sensibility as its fundamental abilities, and inspire us to envision new possible ways of extending/expanding it into different forms of “bodies.”

ACT (Artists Contemporary TOKAS) is a special exhibition introducing artists who practice notable activities, including those who have previously participated in other Tokyo Arts and Space (TOKAS) programs.

Marion PAQUETTE

Marion Paquette participated in “Quebec-Tokyo Exchange Residency Program” (2023) at the Tokyo Arts and Space. In their artistic practice, Paquette creates interfaces and situations through which they explore the delicate relationships between bodies, spaces and objects. Their typical work is a soft sculpture made from textile, paper or other material with a plastic quality, that visualizes the physical transformations and behaviors that are triggered by the interrelations between one’s own singular body and the bodies of those around. Inspired by their interest in the “social body” that emerges in the space between private and public, Paquette also creates works that, with the various playful ideas they incorporate, encourage physical interventions by passersby at public places. During their stay in 2023 as part of a TOKAS residency program, Paquette conducted research into the phenomenon of “inemuri” (dozing) that can be observed at public spaces in Japan, and eventually created “inemuri · 居眠り· dormir présent·e,” a mobile private recreation space that people can take with them wherever they go. Proposing a form of private space that is temporarily set up in a public environment, the work creates situations in which the social body suddenly transforms into a private one.

In this exhibition, Marion Paquette presents a large-scale installation that was inspired by a mycelium structure of fungi that serve as a foundation for ecosystems of living organisms. Unfolding across the entire exhibition space, the work comprises approximately 45 objects made from recycled cloth taken from actual sails that the artist was given by friends back home in Montreal. Visitors are free to walk into the work, and through that physical action, loosely connect the pieces of cloth that have traveled all the way from Canada, along with the personal stories that are contained in every one of them. Just like humans have identified connections between stars in the night sky in the forms of constellations with certain added meanings, through devices that build connections between individual human beings, Marion Paquette reconsiders through their creative work the collective body that is human society. Their performance is scheduled for the closing day of the exhibition.

Marion Paquette was born in Montreal in 1992. Lives and works in Montreal. Graduated with a BA in Visual and Media Arts from the University of Quebec in Montreal in 2015. Recent exhibitions: “inemuri 居眠りdormir présent·e,” Occurrence espace d'art et d'essai contemporains, Montreal, 2024, “Fil · Flux · Figments,” Livart, Montreal, 2024, “Mur Mitoyen,” Espace Transmission, curators Clara and Alexis Cousineau, Montreal, 2023, “entre bleu," Vrille art actuel, La Pocatiere, 2023, “bleu de lieu,” Fondation PHI pour l’art contemporain, Montreal, 2022. 

SHIKICHI Osamu

Shikichi Osamu participated in “OPEN SITE 6” (2021) at the Tokyo Arts and Space. Shikichi explores ways of grasping one’s own body and its “reality” as things that are impossible to perceive objectively from the outside, by way of interacting with other people in our immediate, material environment. Revolving around a central axis of choreography and dance, his works incorporate elements of performance, sculpture, video art, etc., realized through creative processes in which the artist blurs identification methods related to the human body, in order to reconfigure the mechanism of physical perception at large. In the works in the “blooming dots” series that he has been working on continuously since 2020, he uses a smartphone – an indispensable daily life tool for us today, almost like an additional body part – as a “third eye,” to explore the new body languages that emerge when transforming oneself into what seems like someone else’s body, and thereby establishing a “new body that belongs to everyone and no-one.” At the same time, Shikichi focuses also on the physical sensation itself that is spawned through such kinds of interactions, visualizing especially the so-called “autonomous sensory meridian response” (ASMR) – a pleasantly tingling sensation in response to audio-visual stimulation – through forms of movement charged with what he refers to as “WET” (weird erotic tension).

The subject of Shikichi’s work at this exhibition is the Noh play “Izutsu,” in which a woman sees a reflection of herself in the water of a well, wearing her deceased husband’s attire, and performs a dance while imagining his face and remembering the days they spent together. Shikichi translates the story into a performative installation, identifying the woman’s dance with a sensual “lap dance” that is performed for one specific person, based on his own texts related to choreography. Shikichi will also show a performance during the exhibition period.

Shikichi Osamu was born in Saitama in 1994. Lives and works in Brussels and Tokyo. Graduated with P.A.R.T.S. (Performing Arts Training Cycle) in 2024 (dance), and an MA in Film and New Media from Tokyo University of the Arts in 2020. Recent exhibitions: “ ユアファントムアイ、アワクリスタライズペイン / ur phantom eyes, our crystalized pains,” Kaaistudios, Brussels, 2024, “unisex #01,” Camping Asia, Taipei, 2023, “Hyper Ambient Club 'My lips to your ear, my hand on yours, the words moving underneath the shadows we made',” Creative Center Osaka (CCO), 2023, “Subterraneans and Mirrorless Mirror,” gallery αM, Tokyo, 2022, “BankART Under 35 2021 'ama phantom',” BankART KAIKO, Yokohama, 2021. Recent awards: “Grants for Overseas Study by Young Artists,” Pola Art Foundation, 2023, “Yokohama Dance Collection 2020," French Embassy Award for Young Choreographers.

SHOJI Asami

Shoji Asami participated in “TOKAS-Emerging 2016” at the Tokyo Arts and Space. Considering her human body as “the origin of painting,” Shoji has been exploring in her work the physical image and sensation that arises through the experience of “viewing a painting.” Her work at large is characterized by an approach of painting intuitively without defining beforehand what the finished painting will look like, using mainly semitransparent acrylic panels and canvases as support media. She usually begins by drawing a single line without doing any prior sketching, and applies paint, only to remove the paint again by wiping it away. She then gives herself to the image that instinctively appears in her mind in the process, picks up the brush once again to paint, then removes the paint again… It is a cyclic repetition of physical actions, during which the painting gradually takes shape. Birds and other animals, nude human figures, transparent bodies with their bones exposed, and various other images that are coincidentally born in the painted spaces from the strokes of her arms, are all manifestations of the artist herself that exist alongside her actual body. Charged with swirling primitive impulse and emotion, her paintings show human figures with arms opened wide as if offering their body to someone else, or touching each other’s faces with their hands or cheeks, adding a vague sense of affection that stirs the viewer’s senses.

Shoji’s exhibition this time comprises several dozen new works including oil paintings, around a series of drawings as a centerpiece. Scheduled for the opening day is a performance in which the artist paints the window of the exhibition venue, as part of the artist’s attempt to travel back and forth between her body in the painter’s position, and those in the paintings that she makes.

Shoji Asami was born in Fukushima in 1988. Lives and works in Tokyo. Graduated with an MA in Printmaking course from Tama Art University Graduate School of Fine Arts in 2012. Recent exhibitions: “MOT ANNUAL 2024 'on the imagined terrain',” Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, 2024, “October, Much Ado About Nothing,” Semiose, Paris, 2024, “A Stranger’s Tales” Independent Art Fair with LINSEED, New York, 2024, “a Gait Without Foot,” gallery21yo-j,Tokyo, 2023, “Body, Love, Gender,” Gana Art Center, Seoul, Korea, 2023, “Yearning for Vision,” Taro Okamoto Museum of Art, Kanagawa, and others, 2023. Recent awards: “The 31st Gotoh Memorial Cultural Award,” Newcomer's Prize of Art, 2020, “Tokyo Wonder Wall 2015,” Tokyo Wonder Wall Prize, 2015, Selected, “The 18th Taro Okamoto Award for Contemporary Art” (participated as art unit, Conceptual Architect), 2015.

TOKYO ARTS AND SPACE HONGO - TOKAS

2 -4-16 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo

www.tokyoartsandspace.jp

PREVIOUS EDITIONS OF ACT - ARTISTS CONTEMPORARY TOKAS @ TOKYO ARTS AND SPACE, ON WANAFOTO:

1st Edition - ACT 2019 - Artists: Sato Masaharu, Nishimura Yu, Yoshigai Nao

2nd Edition - ACT 2020 - Artists: Tanaka Shusuke, Hirose Nana & Nagatani Kazuma, Watanabe Go

3rd Edition - ACT 2021 - Artists: Tanaka Shusuke, Hirose Nana & Nagatani Kazuma, Watanabe Go

4th Edition - ACT 2022 - Artists: Saito Haruka, Nakazawa Daisuke, Yuasa Ebosi

5th Edition - ACT 2023 - Artists: Ebihara Yasushi, Samejima Yui, Sudo Misa

6th Edition - ACT 2024 - Artists: Ohba Takafumi, Suga Yushi, YOF = Yanagawa Tomoyuki + Ohara Takayoshi + Furusawa Ryu

ACT（Artists Contemporary TOKAS）Vol. 7  "Plural Body/ies"

Updated 18-02-2025

Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 @ Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC & Shanghai Museum

Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

February 28 – September 28, 2025

Shanghai Museum 

November 12, 2025 – March 16, 2026

Incense burner in the form of a goose, China, 

Ming dynasty (1368–1644), early 15th century. Bronze

H. 14 1/2 in. (36.8 cm); W. 18 3/4 in. (47 6 cm)

Purchase, The Vincent Astor Foundation Gift, 2020 - 2020.335a, b

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Water dropper in the form of a rhinoceros

China, Ming dynasty (1368–1644), 15th century, Bronze

H. 2 1/8 in (5.4 cm); W. 5 in. (12.7 cm); D. 1 7/8 in. (4.8 cm)  

Purchase, The Vincent Astor Foundation Gift, 2015 - 2015.294

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

"Taihe" bell, note "Jiazhong"

China, Song dynasty (960–1279), ca. 1105, reinscribed ca. 1174

Bronze, H. 9 in. (22.8 cm)

Courtesy of the Palace Museum, Beijing

In ancient China, bronze vessels were emblems of ritual and power. A millennium later, in the period from 1100 to 1900, such vessels were rediscovered as embodiments of a long-lost golden age that was worthy of study and emulation. This “return to the past” (fugu) was part of a widespread phenomenon across all the arts to reclaim the virtues of a classical tradition. An important aspect of this phenomenon was the revival of bronze casting as a major art form. Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 aims to be the most comprehensive study of Chinese bronzes during this period. This exhibition, co-organized by The Met and the Shanghai Museum, where it will open following its display in New York, presents the new aesthetic represented by these creative adaptations of the past, while exploring their cultural and political significance throughout China’s long history.

“While bronze as an art form has long held a significant role throughout China’s history, this exhibition explores an often-overlooked time period when a resurgence of craftsmanship and artistic achievements revitalized the medium,” said Max Hollein, The Met’s Marina Kellen French Director and Chief Executive Officer. “Bringing together major loans from institutions in China alongside works from The Met collection, this exhibition offers viewers an important opportunity to better understand the lasting aesthetic and cultural impact of bronze objects.”

The exhibition is divided into five thematic and chronological sections that explicate over 200 works of art—an array of bronze vessels complemented by a selection of paintings, ceramics, jades, and other media. Some 100 pieces from The Met collection will be augmented by nearly 100 loans from major institutions in China, Japan, Korea, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States to present the most comprehensive narrative of the ongoing importance of bronzes as an art medium throughout China’s long history. Featured in the exhibition are around 60 loans from institutions in China, including major works such as a monumental 12th-century bell with imperial procession from the Liaoning Provincial Museum, documented ritual bronzes for Confucian temples from the Shanghai Museum, and luxury archaistic vessels made in the 18th-century imperial workshop from the Palace Museum, Beijing.

Vase with archaistic design

China, Yuan dynasty (1271–1368), 14th century

Bronze, H. 15 1/2 in. (39.4 cm) ; Diam. 8 in. (20.3 cm); 

Diam. of rim 4 3/8 in. (11.1 cm); Diam. of foot 5 5/8 in. (14.3 cm) 

Purchase, Brooke Russell Astor Bequest, 2014 - 2014.449

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Ritual vessel (xizun)

China, Qing dynasty (1644–1911), 

Qianlong mark and period (1736–95)

Bronze, H. 15 3/16 in. (38.6 cm);

Diam. 4 5/16 in. (11 cm); Wt. 36,4 lb (16.5 kg)

Courtesy of the Palace Museum, Beijing

The exhibition begins with the section “Reconstructing Ancient Rites,” which introduces how emperors and scholar-officials commissioned ritual bronzes from the 12th to the 16th century as part of an effort to restore and align themselves with antique ceremonies and rites. The exhibition continues with “Experimenting with Styles,” illustrating how the form, decoration, and function of ancient bronzes were creatively reinterpreted from the 13th to the 15th century. The next section, “Establishing New Standards,” explores further transformations in both the aesthetic and technical direction of bronze making from the 15th to the 17th century. The fourth section, “Living with Bronzes,” features a display in the Ming Furniture Room (Gallery 218) to demonstrate how bronzes were used in literati life from the 16th to the 19th century. The last section, “Harmonizing with Antiquity,” examines how the deep scholarly appreciation of archaic bronzes during the 18th and 19th centuries led to a final flourishing of bronze production.

Pengliang Lu, Brooke Russell Astor Curator of Chinese Art at The Met, said: “This exhibition attempts a long-overdue reevaluation of later Chinese bronzes by seeking to establish a reliable chronology of this art form across the last millennium of Chinese history. The exhibition will also distinguish outstanding works from lesser examples based on their artistic and cultural merits.”

This exhibition provides visitors with a captivating experience as they follow the shifting cultural roles and evolving canons of beauty represented in later bronzes.

Installation view of Recasting the Past: 

The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900, 

on view February 28 – September 28, 2025 

at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

Photo by Paul Lachenauer, courtesy of The Met

Installation view of Recasting the Past: 

The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900, 

on view February 28 – September 28, 2025 

at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

Photo by Paul Lachenauer, courtesy of The Met

Installation view of Recasting the Past: 

The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900, 

on view February 28 – September 28, 2025 

at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

Photo by Paul Lachenauer, courtesy of The Met

Later Chinese bronzes have long been stigmatized as poor imitations of ancient bronzes rather than being seen as fundamentally new creations with their own aesthetic and functional character. This exhibition redresses this misunderstanding by showcasing their artistic virtuosity, innovative creativity, and wide cultural impact. Through archaeologically recovered examples and cross-medium comparisons to a wide range of objects, the exhibition demonstrates the ongoing importance and influence of bronzes as well as how they inspired the form and function of works in other media.

Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 is curated by Pengliang Lu, Brooke Russell Astor Curator of Chinese Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue. A beautiful and very interesting book!

Recasting the Past

The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100-1900

by Pengliang Lu

Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art 

Distributed by Yale University Press

304 pages, 9.50 x 11.20 in, 300 color illus.

Hardcover, 9781588397904, 15 April 2025

METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

The Met Fifth Avenue, Galleries 209-218

www.metmuseum.org

SHANGHAI MUSEUM

www.shanghaimuseum.net