Film director Akira Kurosawa (1910-1998) is perhaps more famous outside Japan than any other of his fellow countrymen. This is partly because his films confirmed the gaijin view of his country as a land of geisha, samurai and warlords, but also because he made artistic films that, especially in Europe, were a welcome antidote to Hollywood's formulaic outpourings. For anyone wishing to gain a deeper understanding of the great director and his working methods, the current exhibition at Yokohama's Sogo Museum is a must.

Featuring storyboard drawings and paintings in pencil, crayon, watercolor and gouache that he made for several of his films, the exhibition shows the keen artistic eye and visual sense of a man who could quite easily have become a painter instead of a director. As a youngster he aspired to be an artist and had some of his paintings accepted for exhibition, but his inability to pass an art-school entrance exam meant that the art world's loss became the film world's gain.

Unfortunately none of his early paintings are on display, so the only way to judge his painterly skills is from the storyboards that he dashed off at great speed. Unburdened by an excess of artistic technique and free from the conscious attempt to create "art," Kurosawa painted with a panache and energy that, despite its roughness, produced several pictures quite capable of standing their ground as works of art.