Transport authorities launched a full-fledged investigation Sunday into the derailment of a bullet train on the Akita Shinkansen Line in Daisen, Akita Prefecture, on Saturday afternoon.
It's a dangerous, unpredictable world. Twice in January Chinese warships in the East China Sea challenged Japan's Maritime Self Defense Forces patrols in a manner deemed threatening. And on Feb. 12 came North Korea's nuclear test.
Here's an open secret: Japanese men have a bad international reputation on the romance front.
SELLING WOMEN: Prostitution, Markets and the Household in Early Modern Japan, by Amy Stanley. University of California Press, 2012, 282 pp., $49.95 (hardcover) In the vast cultural landscape, Japan fascinates the mainstream with manga and anime, the martial arts, Zen and kimono. Of course, ...
Kenta Maeda shook off worries about his form with five shutout innings as Japan beat China 5-2 in first-round Pool A of the World Baseball Classic on Sunday at Fukuoka Dome. Japan improved to 2-0 following a tough win over Brazil in Saturday evening’s ...
Looking at Eilika Krishar’s thin, delicate physique, you probably wouldn’t be able to imagine what an incredible voice the German opera singer has. After winning the 2010 Premium Audition singing contest in Switzerland, Krishar was met with a stream of compliments from music critics. ...
The Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 left residents of Rikuzentakata in Iwate Prefecture with no option but to live in isolated temporary shelters as they wrestled with the uncertainty of their future. To help lift their spirits, architect Toyo Ito proposed building a ...
Western-style painter Ei Nakau’s preferred style is abstraction. In 1968, he began a series titled “Cielito Lindo,” a project to which he still contributes 40 years later. As is evident in the way he pours paints directly onto the canvas, Nakau values unpredictability and ...
The National Art Center’s “Artist File” is an annual project, which began in 2008 with the aim of introducing the latest trends in Japan’s art industry. It looks for diversity by deliberately avoiding any specific theme for artists to work with and by accepting ...
The 20th century witnessed two world wars, during which many countries suffered what is known as “strategic bombing”: major air raids on cities aimed at destroying the nation’s economic ability and public spirit. Tokyo suffered the Operation Meetinghouse air raid by the U.S military ...
Symbolic of Tokyo’s Asahi Beer Hall is a gigantic golden sculpture that sits atop the building and is the shape of, well, a roaring flame — at least that’s officially what it’s supposed to be. (Though ask any child and they’ll give you a ...
Manabu Miyazaki uses a self-devised system of infrared sensors and robotic cameras to get wild animals to unwittingly take self portraits. The title of the exhibition, “The Pencil of Nature,” takes its name from a publication by the British photography pioneer William Henry Fox ...
Over his 70-year career, Genichiro Inokuma (1902-1993) made several critical changes to his painting style. He began as a realist portrait artist, then moved onto geometric abstraction after the World War II, before becoming obsessed with portraying faces. His work initially appears to lack ...
It is said that the Japanese Buddhist monk Enku (1632-1695) carved as many as 120,000 wooden Buddha statues during his lifetime pilgrimage to shrines nationwide. He is renowned for the respect he had for the wood he worked with, taking into account and highlighting ...
For many, classic Westerns, with their depiction of the spirit and struggles of the new American frontier, bring up feelings of nostalgia. Their stereotypical gunfights, tough sheriffs and rugged wilderness keep them popular — even though for contemporary film, the genre is now waning. ...
