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Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Feb 19, 2014

NNTT debut peers behind the masks of 'Condemned' Sartre family

Until Japan was opened to the West in the mid-19th century, its theater culture mainly comprised traditional forms such as kabuki, comic kyōgen, bunraku (puppet theater) and noh.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 19, 2014

'Flying Expressions from the New Collection'

This exhibition focuses on the different forms of artistic expression of Maki Yamashita (1890-1973), Ryonosuke Shimomura (1923-1998) and Jun Tsukawaki (1952-), whose works were acquired by the Otani Memorial Art Museum, Nishinomiya City, in 2012.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 13, 2014

Making sense of cultural nonsense

In today's complicated world of mass media and communication, contemporary British artists are finding new means of expression.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 29, 2014

Once admired from afar, now enjoyed up close

Billed as an exhibition of masterpieces from the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA), 'Admired from Afar' is the latest in a number of exhibitions of Japanese art from American collections.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 22, 2014

Encounters with the modern that both frustrated and inspired Japanese artists

When Japanese audiences turn their attention to modern art they tend to favor the 'original' works from the West, while foreign viewers all too often find Japan's foray into oil painting too similar to the Western model.
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 18, 2014

Will Japan prepared mean nature ruined?

"Resilience" is a hot topic these days — not in self-help books, but among policymakers worldwide. As governments become convinced that climate change is a real threat, they are taking steps to ensure communities can bounce back from the increasing impact of floods, storms, fires and droughts they...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 15, 2014

The extent of Puvis de Chavannes' stately influence

When you enter 'Arcadia by the Shore' it is not difficult to get a sense of why Puvis de Chavannes was so successful in his own day, and why his reputation later slipped far behind those of other painters then considered his inferiors.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 15, 2014

'Admired from Afar: Masterworks of Japanese Painting from The Cleveland Museum of Art'

The Cleveland Museum of Art, which houses one of the best collections of Japanese art in the world, brings 50 masterpieces to Tokyo.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 15, 2014

'Private Utopia: Contemporary Art from the British Council Collection'

What happens when curators from various Japanese museums are given free rein to select works from the holdings of the London-based British Council Collection
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 8, 2014

New York's Apples make a big impression

In the last three months since I arrived in New York to study American drama with a grant from the Asian Cultural Council, a U.S. nonprofit dedicated to international cultural exchange, I have been to the theater more than 70 times — including at least a dozen visits to somewhere that's been a truly...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 8, 2014

'Art and Poetry: Waka Inspired Masterpieces'

A picture is worth a thousand words. But, it seems, some settle for just 31 syllables. Or something like that.
Japan Times
JAPAN / GETTING SERIOUS ABOUT ENGLISH
Jan 2, 2014

Schools fret about assistant teachers ahead of proposed 2020 reforms

With education reform expected to place a great deal of emphasis on English, officials worry about the uneven quality of foreign assistant language teachers.
EDITORIALS
Dec 25, 2013

Rein in government spending

The government's draft budget for fiscal 2014, which Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet approved Tuesday, reflects a lack of government will to reduce public spending and debt even as the tax burden on consumers is set to increase.
Japan Times
CULTURE
Dec 19, 2013

Comiket, where otaku come to share the love

The Tokyo International Exhibition Center, better known as Tokyo Big Sight, boasts an area of more than 80,000 sq. meters of exhibition space. It's the country's largest convention center and will host wrestling, fencing and taekwondo during the 2020 Olympics.
EDITORIALS
Dec 13, 2013

Abe's stimulus only a short-term fix

The Abe administration's latest stimulus package has the central government spending more than it is due to receive in revenue from the fiscal 2014 tax hike, showing that the Japanese economy has yet to enter a self-sustaining cycle built on private-sector demand and investment.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Dec 9, 2013

Otaku culture gets under the skin

Tattoos in Japan have long moved on from the kind often romanticized by the West — that imagery of flamboyant yakuza that so many seem reluctant to relinquish. But a brief glance at the policies of Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto reveals a nation still unwilling to allow tattoos into mainstream society...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Dec 4, 2013

'Second Steps' marks a great leap forward for dancers

From The Royal Ballet's innovative 2011 "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" at Covent Garden to Paris Opera Ballet's devotion to contemporary choreographers such as Mats Ek, Wayne McGregor and Pina Bausch, national dance companies across the globe are taking steps to ensure ballet transforms into a modern...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 4, 2013

'The 150th Anniversary: The Prints of Edvard Munch from the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo'

In celebration of the 150th anniversary of symbolist painter Edvard Munch's birth, this exhibition showcases 34 of the artist's prints, mostly early works focusing on life, death and love — themes that he became particularly known for.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / BACKSTREET STORIES
Nov 23, 2013

Season's greetings garnered in Tokyo's Yanaka Ginza

On only a budget of u00a520,000, you can generate a lot of warmth with gifts from Ginza — Yanaka Ginza, that is.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Nov 23, 2013

Ozeki's work reflects her complex identity

Ruth Ozeki's recent novel, the 2013 Man Booker-shortlisted "A Tale For the Time Being," is best described as a hybrid: a fictional masterpiece with footnotes and appendices like a research paper; a colorful scrawl of inventive creativity marked by scientific asides ranging from ocean gyres to quantum...
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: FASHION
Nov 11, 2013

Huge headwear, film shorts and the fashion in between

Uniqlo gives the fleece a makeover
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Nov 6, 2013

Divided opinions on Divisionism

By the time you get to the end of the Divisionism exhibition, now showing at the National Art Center Tokyo, you realize that this strand in the history of art is more about the journey than the destination. It's like traveling through a world that becomes increasingly less realistic but nevertheless...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 30, 2013

'Total abandon' for two landmark duos

Ballet audiences in Japan are widely acknowledged to be among the best in the world, but there's still a lot to be learned here about contemporary dance. However, those seeing a show in a short tour of works by French choreographers Mathilde Monnier and Jean-Francois Duroure can be sure of enjoying a...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Oct 26, 2013

Manga: Gekiga capture the underbelly of ’70s Japan

'I don't know much about manga but I know what I like' could well be the title of this review. Despite the urgings of enthusiastic friends ever since the 1970s, I sedulously avoided reading works in this genre.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 16, 2013

'Edward II': The director's take

Two years ago, Shintaro Mori made his directorial debut at the New National Theatre, Tokyo, with a minimalist production of Samuel Beckett's absurdist masterpiece "Waiting for Godot." Now, at age 37, he's back there at the helm of probably one of the West's first-ever plays with an openly gay theme —...
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Oct 13, 2013

What we talk about when we talk about the Olympics

If you're lamenting the number of kōji (工事, construction works) clogging Tokyo streets and coating your lungs with toxic fumes, you can lump at least part of the blame on the Olympics, slated to happen in the summer of 2020. And take comfort in the fact that in the years leading up to the last time...
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Oct 11, 2013

Camera Grandma's photos document Gifu village's demise

Izu Photo Museum in Nagaizumi, Shizuoka Prefecture, is exhibiting the work of late amateur photographer Tazuko Masuyama on the Tokuyama Dam in Gifu Prefecture, where a small village vanished under the waters of a reservoir decades ago.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 9, 2013

'Captivating Qing-dynasty Ceramics'

Chinese ceramics made during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912) are considered some of the finest in the world. Their delicate aesthetics and attention to elaborate detail, made such works particularly popular with the European nobility of that time. As their popularity and value increased overseas, more works...

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past