An exhibition of art treasures from Taipei's National Palace Museum that is being shown at the Tokyo National Museum through Sept. 15 is attracting a large number of Japanese interested in Chinese artwork. The event at the Heiseikan Special Exhibition Galleries, the first such exhibit held in an Asian country outside Taiwan, is so popular that it attracted some 210,000 visitors from its opening on June 24 through late July. It is hoped that relations between Japan and Taiwan will deepen not only in the economic field but also in the field of cultural exchanges.
The Kuomintang government, which ruled the Republic of China, moved art treasures from the National Palace Museum in Beijing to safety in inland areas during Japan's military aggression from the 1930s. It then moved them to Taiwan when it fled to the island after being defeated in civil war by the Chinese Communist forces led by Mao Zedong in 1949, and the National Palace Museum has some 700,000 works of art. During China's tumultuous Cultural Revolution in the 1960s and '70s, historic cultural objects were thought to represent "old ways of thinking" and many were destroyed, so the Kuomintang's decision to move these priceless works of art to Taiwan might have saved them from such a fate.
Some 180 works of art are on display at the Tokyo National Museum. Among them are vessels made of jewels and bronzeware as well as works of calligraphy. The exhibition includes a Qing dynasty artwork titled "Jadeite Cabbage," which was made some time in the 18th or 19th century and has never been lent out before. The piece, which looks like a real cabbage and was on display for only the first two weeks of the exhibition, was so popular that at times people had to wait in line for four hours to see it.