STEPS AHEAD: Recent Acquisitions in the Artizon Museum

The Ishibashi Foundation is known for their very substantial collection of Impressionist and Japanese modern Western-style paintings, but in recent years they have expanded their collection to include art from the early 20th century to the present, mainly abstract expression, and modern Japanese art. We are very much looking forward to this exhibition, which will feature 201 works including 92 new acquisitions, and 87 works from the collection of portrait photographs of artists.

[Outline]
The exhibition covers a wide range of content and themes, from Cubism, which is concerned with the emergence of abstract expressionism, to the drawings of Henri Matisse, Marcel Duchamp, women painters of abstract expressionism, Takiguchi Shuzo and Experimental Workshop, and contemporary Australian painting.

Opened in January 2020, this exhibition allows the audience to enjoy the “now” of the Artizon Museum and its collection, which continues to develop together with its fans.

If you are using a smartphone, please remember to bring your earphones. You can enjoy a free audio guide of the collection by voice actor Mr. Yoshimasa Hosoya on the app.

[Highlights]
Recent acquisitions are introduced with ambitious and broad themes.themes.
Cubist artists involved in the emergence of abstract painting
The works of Cubist artists, the most important movement in the early 20th century, along with Picasso and Black, Jean Metzinger’s “Still Life on a Pedestal Table” (1916) and Albert Gleizes’s “Woman with a Glove” (c.1922) will be on display as new acquisitions.

Painting and Sculpture after 1945
There is also an extensive collection of post-war Japanese, European, and American paintings and sculptures. Joan Miro’s “Painting” (1952), Marcel Duchamp’s “From or by Marcel Duchamp and Rrose Sélavy’s “Box in a Valise” (1952), and Onosato Toshinobu’s “Vermillion Circle” (1959) are on view.

Women Abstract Expressionists
The works of Lee Krasner, Elaine De Kooning, Helen Frankenthaler, and Joan Mitchell, women artists who made a significant mark during the same period as the avant-garde art movement and Abstract Expressionism that emerged in New York after World War II, will be featured.

Australian Art: Contemporary Aboriginal Art
Contemporary art by Australia’s indigenous Aboriginal people will be introduced.
Collection of Portrait Photographs of Artists
The exhibition will feature selected works from a collection of approximately 700 vintage photographs of portraits of Western artists from the 19th to early 20th centuries.