This database is a comprehensive collection of articles from Nihon bijutsu nenkan (Year Book of
Japanese Art), published by the Tokyo National Institute for Cultural Properties (Tobunken).
On October 18, the Council for Cultural Affairs (Commissioner: MIYATA Ryōhei) submitted a report on six buildings to be designated as Important Cultural Properties to SHIMOMURA Hakubun, Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The list includes the Nasu Shrine (Ōtawara City, Tochigi Prefecture), whose structure combines medieval forms with early modern decorative design, and the former Kōyaguchi school building, which is considered to be the culmination of pre-war wooden school buildings. In addition to the list, two districts, one of which was the Masuda district in Yokote City, Akita Prefeture, where one of few merchant houses that were purposely built to cope with heavy snowfall in the Tōhoku region remains, were also suggested to be the Important Preservation Districts for Groups of Traditional Buildings. (Japanese)
The winners of the 25th Kokka Prize, an award for remarkable research on Japanese and East Asian art, were announced. The Kokka Prize was given to an article titled ‘Kusha mandara to tenpyō fukko’ (in ‘Bukkyō bijutsu ronbunshū I: Yōshiki hen’, Chikurinsha, 2012) by TANIGUCHI Kōsei (Nara National Museum). The Kokka Special Prize was given to a monograph titled ‘Chūgoku sekkutsu bijutsu no kenkyū’ (Chūō kōron bijutsu shuppan, 2012) by HAMADA Tamami (Waseda University). (Japanese)
On October 4, the Okada Museum of Art (Director: KOBAYASHI Tadashi) opened in Kowakudani, Hakone, Kanagawa Prefecture, presenting a wide range of Japanese and East Asian art from ancient to modern times. The museum houses about 700 works of art collected by OKADA Kazuo, a businessman who developed his business in the manufacture of amusement machines. With five basement floors that create an exhibition area of 5,000 m2, it is the largest private museum of its kind in Japan. The exhibition, titled ‘Heritage of Beauty: Japanese, Chinese and Korean Art’ (October 4 – December 30), was held to celebrate its opening. (Japanese)
On September 28, the Akita Museum of Art opened in Area Nakaichi, a redevelopment area in the center of Akita City. It was relocated from the former Akita Prefectural Museum of Art (opened in 1967), which housed the collection of HIRANO Masakichi, a wealthy Akita collector, located in Chiaki Park in the city. The new building, designed by ANDŌ Tadao, has three floors above ground and one below ground, with a total floor space of 3,746.66m2. Although it had been open provisionally since 2012, it was officially opened after the relocation of the mural painting, titled ‘Events in Akita (Akita no gyōji)’ by FOUJITA Tsuguharu. The exhibition, titled ‘Hekiga “Akita no gyōji” kara no messēji – Fujita Tsuguharu no 1930 nendai’ (September 28 – November 10), was held to celebrate its opening. (Japanese)
On September 17, the laureates of the 25th Praemium Imperiale in Honor of Prince Takamatsu (organized by the Japan Art Association), which publicly honors individual world artists, were announced. In relation to art, the laureates are Michelangelo Pistoletto (Italy) in the Painting category, Antony Gormley (United Kingdom) in the Sculpture category and David Chipperfield (United Kingdom) in the Architecture category. (Japanese)
On July 19, the Council for Cultural Affairs (Commissioner: MIYATA Ryōhei) submitted a report on 173 structures to be designated as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties to SHIMOMURA Hakubun, Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The list includes the main building of Tokyo Institute of Technology (Meguro Ward, Tokyo), which became a symbol of reconstruction after the Great Kantō Earthquake, and the main building of the Wakayama Prefectural Government Office with its Western-style design. (Japanese)
On July 19, the Council for Cultural Affairs (Commissioner: MIYATA Ryōhei) submitted a report on four people to be designated as Important Intangible Cultural Properties (Living National Treasures) to SHIMOMURA Hakubun, Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The list includes MAETA Akihiro, ceramic artist who creates white porcelain with a full of modern sensibility, and YAMASHITA Yoshito, lacquer artist who employs the technique of engraving patterns into the surface of lacquer work and filling them with colored urushi lacquer, called kinma. (Japanese)
On July 12, the winners of the 8th Western Art Foundation Prize, which publicly honor individuals and institutions involved in curating exhibitions that have contributed to the understanding of Western art and academic research in the field of Western art, were announced. The Academic Prizes for individuals were awarded to HOSAKA Kenjirō, Curator at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (for the exhibition ‘Francis Bacon’) and JINGAOKA Megumi, Curator at the National Museum of Western Art (for the exhibition ‘Hubert Robert – Les jardins du Temps’). The Cultural Promotion Prize for Institutions was given to the Pola Art Foundation, which has supported a number of exhibitions by providing grants. (Japanese)
On July 8, as part of Phase 1, Project 2 of the Heisei Renovations (2013-2018), the restoration of the National Treasure, Yōmeimon Gate at Nikkō Tōshōgū began. The work involved repainting the sculptures, metal fittings and the exterior of the entire building. In July, the wooden panels, called hameita, on the east and west walls, which had been decorated with peony relief carvings, were removed to reveal tōyu makie on the wall beneath them. KANŌ Yūsei painted their sketches during the restoration in the Hōreki era. They were opened to the public in November. (Japanese)
On April 30, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), an advisory body to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) that conducts preliminary inspections to determine whether sites should be inscribed on the World Heritage List, recommended the inclusion of Mount Fuji (Yamanashi Prefecture, Shizuoka Prefecture), which has been an object of worship and art since the ancient time, on the World Heritage List. In response, on June 22, the 37th UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee, held in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, decided to inscribe Mount Fuji on the World Heritage List as a Cultural Heritage Site. Miho no Matsubara, which had been recommended for exclusion by ICOMOS on the grounds that it could not be regarded as part of Mount Fuji, was also allowed to be inscribed as a constituent asset after a series of objections from member countries. The Japanese government withdrew its recommendation to the World Heritage Committee for Kamakura, which had been recommended for inscription as the ancient capital of the samurai government, after ICOMOS recommended that the site should not be inscribed. (Japanese)
On June 21, the Council for Cultural Affairs (Commissioner: MIYATA Ryōhei) submitted a report on the following places to be designated as Places of Scenic Beauty or Historic Sites to SHIMOMURA Hakubun, Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology. The list includes two places such as the Hiunkaku Garden (Takamatsu City) to be appointed as Places of Scenic Beauty; 11 places such as the Makimuku Site (Sakurai City, Nara Prefecture), which is considered to be the most promising site for the theory that states that the Yamataikoku was located in the Kinai region, to be appointed as Historic Sites; 13 places such as four buildings of the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Sites, including the Former Shiroyama National School Buildings, (Nagasaki City), to be registered as Registered Monuments; and three places such as the Sakatani Sakamoto Terraced Rice Fields and Rural Landscape (Nichinan City, Miyazaki Prefecture) to be selected as Important Cultural Landscape. (Japanese)
On June 18, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) decided an international advisory committee meeting in Gwangju, South Korea to register ‘Materials Related to the Keichō Mission to Europe’ (Sendai City Museum Collection), which relates to HASEKURA Tsunenaga, a samurai of the Sendai domain, who was dispatched to Rome in the early Edo period, as well as ‘Midō Kanpakuki’ (Yōmei Bunko Collection, Kyoto City), a diary of FUJIWARA no Michinaga, a court nobleman of the mid-Heian period, as Memory of the World. (Japanese)
On June 13, the exhibition ‘Lacas Namban: Huellas de Japón en España’ opened at Museo Nacional de Artes decorativas, Madrid (until September 29). The exhibition was part of a series of events commemorating the 400th anniversary of Spanish-Japanese relations as well as marking the 400th anniversary of the departure of the Keichō mission to Spain, led by HASEKURA Tsunenaga. The exhibition brought together a collection of lacquerware from the Nanban chest in the collection of Monasterio de las Descalzas Reales, as well as other pieces from around Spain. (Japanese)
On June 9, the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, bid successfully on a Japanese chest for 7.3 million euros (approximately 950 million yen) at an auction. This lacquer chest, made in Japan in the early Edo period, was originally purchased by French cardinal Jules Mazarin in 1658 and was found in a private house in France. One of the four Japanese chests owned by the Mazarin family, this is one of the finest pieces of Japanese export lacquerware, made entirely of black-lacquered wood lavishly decorated with gold maki-e and raden (shell inlay) decoration. It came into the possession of Sir Trevor Lawrence, a British collector of Japanese art, in 1882, but went missing since 1941. (Japanese)
On June 1, the opening ceremony and awards ceremony of la Biennale di Venezia, the world’s largest biennial international contemporary art exhibition, were held in Venice, Italy, with the Japan Pavilion receiving a Special Mention in a category of the national participations where 88 nations participated. The Japan Pavilion, curated by KURAYA Mika, Chief Curator of the Department of Fine Arts at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, presented TANAKA Kōki’s solo exhibition titled ‘abstract speaking-sharing uncertainty and collective acts’, which mainly consisted of video works inspired by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. (Japanese)
On May 18, the selection process of the Teijiro Nakahara Prize (sponsored by Asahikawa City, Hokkaido and its City Board of Education), which was established to contribute to the development of the Japanese sculpture world, took place. UEMATSU Keiji’s ‘Cutting – Axis・Latitude・Longitude’ was selected as the 38th prize winner. (Japanese)
On May 17, the Council for Cultural Affairs (Commissioner: MIYATA Ryōhei) submitted a report on one building to be designated as a National Treasures and nine buildings to be designated as Important Cultural Properties to SHIMOMURA Hakubun, Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The list includes Bannaji (Ashikagashi City, Tochigi Prefecture), a medieval esoteric Buddhist temple that represents East Japan to be designated as a National Treasure; and the Former Residence of the Maeda Family (Meguro Ward, Tokyo), built in the early Shōwa period by the former feudal lord of the Kaga domain, to be designated as an Important Cultural Property. In addition to the list, Tsuwano (Tsuwano Town, Shimane Prefecture) and Jōtō (Tsuyama City, Okayama Prefecture) were also suggested to be the Important Preservation Districts for Groups of Traditional Buildings. At the same time, it also called for the lifting of the designation of the main hall of Kinzanji (Okayama City) as an Important Cultural Property, which burned down in 2012. (Japanese)
On April 15, the government budget for the fiscal year 2013 (Heisei 25) was passed. The budget for the Agency for Cultural Affairs became ¥103.342 billion, increased by 0.14%, which is ¥142 million increase compared to the previous year. The budget is divided into three principal projects as follows: 1. Creation and utilization of rich culture and arts and cultivation of human resources; 2. Preservation, utilization and succession of Japan’s precious cultural properties; and 3. Dissemination of Japan’s outstanding culture and arts / promotion of international cultural exchange. Major categories whose budget increased in each project are as follows: in Project 1, ¥450 million for ‘Program for Cultural and Art Promotion Utilizing Universities’; in Project 2, ¥1.7 billion for ‘Project to Revitalize the Local Community by Cultural Property Buildings’; ¥3.2 billion for ‘Project to Promote Integrated Use and Support of Historic Landmarks that Utilize Local Characteristics’; ¥1.01 billion for ‘Project to Support Creative Activities at Art Museums and History Museums as the Core of the Local Community’; and ¥3.384 billion for ‘Project to Revitalize the Local Community by Using Cultural Heritage’. (Japanese)
The National Archives of Modern Architecture opened in Yushima, Tokyo, to collect and preserve materials relating to pre-war and post-war Japanese architecture, which is under the direct control of the Agency for Cultural Affairs. ANDŌ Tadao was appointed to be Honorary Director. A special exhibition was held to celebrate its opening, titled ‘Tokyo Olympics in Architectural Documents from the 1964 Yoyogi National Stadium to the 2020 New National Stadium’ (May 8 – June 14), which included drawings of the Yoyogi National Stadium designed by TANGE Kenzō. (Japanese)
The winners of the 7th Yomiuri Aoniyoshi Prize (sponsored by the Yomiuri Shimbun with special support from the Japan Society for the Conservation of Cultural Property), which publicly honors individuals and organizations for their outstanding achievements in the fields of conservation science and restoration, were announced. The Aoniyoshi Prize was given to AWATA Junji, who carries on the tradition of Anōshū, a group of stonemasons who were highly respected by Oda Nobunaga and is engaged in repairing castle stonewalls. TORIHARA Yūji, who produces gold and silver threads for gold brocade and other materials used in the decoration of cultural properties, received the Encouragement Prize, and the Sumitomo Foundation (President: SUMITOMO Kichizaemon), which provides grants for the restoration of cultural properties, was selected for the Special Prize. (Japanese)
