Tanaka Isson: Better late than never
Limited success in Tokyo led Tanaka Isson (1908-77) to burn his sketchbooks, sell his house, and move to Oshima, where he lived in near poverty painting in a vibrant style that posthumously captured the nation's heart.
Western acts take note: Joy and enthusiasm are the key to winning over Summer Sonic crowds
British rocker Noel Gallagher has developed a reputation in recent years for delivering biting, hilarious one-liners, both in interviews and at concerts. In front of the crowd as the Saturday night headliner for Tokyo's leg of Summer Sonic, however, the former Oasis brain trust ...
Sunset and a glimpse of Mount Fuji add to Tom Misch's Tokyo debut
As the sun began to set on this year's Summer Sonic, London-born singer Tom Misch took to the Beach Stage for his first live appearance in Tokyo. Misch, who released his debut album "Geography" in April, performs an upbeat mix of lo-fi funk and soul. ...
'Killing for the Prosecution': A complex crime drama stuffed with exposition
Once a maker of Hollywood-style sci-fi ("Gunhed," 1989) and noir ("Painted Desert," 1993), Masato Harada has become a director of films about fact-based, character-testing group missions, be it police routing radicals from a Karuizawa villa ("The Choice of Hercules," 2002) or samurai fighting the ...
'Penguin Highway': What goes up must come down ... in penguin form
'The Exorcist Nurse': Horror hits the hospital for some summer chills
Mission: Accomplished — Simon Pegg's path to blockbuster stardom
'Sensei Kunshu': Looking for love in all the wrong places
'Flavors of Youth': A China-focused anthology falls flat
'Bleach': Easy entry into an action-packed manga world
Aretha Franklin, the undisputed "Queen of Soul" who sang with matchless style on such classics as "Think," "I Say a Little Prayer" and her signature song, "Respect," and stood as a cultural icon around the globe, has died at age 76 from pancreatic cancer. Publicist ...
Summer Sonic's helter-skelter lineup provides a lot of chances for younger Japanese acts
Jia Pengfang left his home in rural China with an erhu and a dream
'Japanese Satchmo' moved to tears after New Orleans honor
Towa Tei goes deep on death and puns
Author Haruki Murakami talks about his favorite songs and love of running on special radio show
More hip-hop, more J-pop and a typhoon: Fuji Rock 2018 was full of new energy
Mami Kosemura says it with flowers
Where Flemish still-life painters combined fruit, vegetables and flowers that could not normally be picked in the same season, and portrayed them together in an imaginary, but highly realistic pictorial space, Kosemura uses contemporary tools to achieve the same with photographic detail.
Swedish roots in Japan's taxonomy
Bertrand Lavier's 'Medley' blows hot and cold
Of the many items in a calligrapher's toolbox, the most important are words
Jomon art: Japan's prehistoric charm
Setting the kanji free: A calligrapher walks the line between tradition and the abstract
A photographer's return to Aomori
When he was 16, Hideto Iwai was perplexed as to why everyone around him unquestioningly jumped onto society's student-to-salaryman conveyor belt. So, he broke free, dropping out of high school and picking up casual jobs where he could find them. "But then I had problems ...
Manga and kabuki collide in an action-packed 'Naruto'
Could Japan have its own Cirque du Soleil?
Keeping the lesson of Hiroshima alive through one family's story
In Yokohama, they'll be dancing in the streets
Drum Tao aims for blockbuster grandeur in its latest production
Aretha Franklin came to Washington to sing — and for history
As a 21-year-old Aretha Franklin worked on her singing voice in New York during the summer of 1963 as her father, the Rev. C. L. Franklin, raced to finish the final touches on the planned March on Washington. Nearly five decades later, Franklin found herself ...
Beating the King of Pop, The Eagles have No. 1 album of all-time, selling 38 million copies
#MeToo activist Asia Argento settled sex assault complaint involving actor when he was 17: report
Mali singer Khaira Arby, 'Nightingale of Timbuktu,' dies at 59
Melodious service honors Aretha Franklin at father's Detroit Baptist church
Respect: In Aretha Franklin's anthems, women heard an empowering message
Fans gather in New York, Los Angeles to bid farewell to Aretha Franklin
'Dear Diary Boy': A vivid insider's look at education and mothering in Japan
Kumiko Makihara's recently published memoir "Dear Diary Boy" might well come with a trigger warning for parents of school-aged children in Japan. Many will be able to relate to the references to heaps of homework, judgmental parents and teachers, long lists of things that ...
Fumiko Enchi: A critical advocate of female empowerment
'The Penguin Book of Haiku': Morsels of poetry from the mountaintop to the gutter
Kenzaburo Oe's 'Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids' condemns wartime cruelty
'The Bear and the Paving Stone': Whimsical stories celebrating language, friendship and life
'The Emissary': Power, poison, pain and joy inside its DNA
'First Snow on Fuji': Yasunari Kawabata exhibits his mastery of the short story
The small screen needs the small mercies of 'Terrace House'
Television has long been my connection to home. White Walkers ushering in an apocalyptic winter, Cold War sleeper agents going rogue, robots running amok in an Old West theme park — all of these have but a passing resemblance to my former life in ...
Rainy season is a great time to binge-watch anime
'The Bachelor Japan' promises more drama in its second season
Yuko Takeuchi steps into an iconic role on 'Miss Sherlock' with elementary ease
Yuki Kimura may have struck out on 'The Bachelor Japan,' but she won the people's rose
