Japan has always been a pioneer in the rapid shifting of lifestyle, technology and other areas of life. Despite its fast progress, the country managed to preserve its traditions and to this day maintains many of its cultural identities.
While recovering from the aftermath of World War II, for instance, the Japanese community held tight the highly refined traditional arts that include such forms as the tea ceremony, calligraphy, ikebana (flower arranging) and gardening, as well as architecture, painting, sculpture and photography. The Japanese made it a priority to spread their culture outside their country through the 20 exhibitions that are held at over 100 museums and cultural facilities every year.
Curated by photography critic Kotaro Iizawa, the travelling exhibition “TOKYO- Before/After” features a selection of approximately 80 works by eleven photographers who had captured images of Tokyo in the 1930s and 40s and juxtaposed against photographs taken after 2010.
The 1930-40s before World War II had been times in which the current framework of Tokyo had begun to take form, and photographers had effectively utilised highly developing means of photographic expression to establish vibrant images of urban space where tradition and modernity contended with one another.
On the other hand, Tokyo since the 2010s, while taking it upon itself to confront and address the fluidising social circumstances after the Great East Japan Earthquake, is further undergoing a significant transformation towards the 2020 Olympic Games. Photographers are also trying to emphasise their perspectives while incorporating the alternating and ever-changing means of photographic expression brought about through rapid digitisation.
By comparing photographs for these two distinct periods, the past, present and future image of Tokyo comes to emerge and reveal itself.
“While interest in Tokyo continues to grow throughout the world in anticipation of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, we hope that the works of the Japanese photographers in this exhibition, through their specific imagery, will serve to encourage a deeper understanding of Tokyo as a vast city of many different faces”, said officials from the Japan Foundation; a public agency, which was established in 1972 to promote international understanding through cultural exchange.
The exhibition includes photographs by KOGA, NIPPON, Kineo Kuwabara, Nobuyoshi Araki, Mika Ninagawa, Motoyuki Daifu, Shintaro SATO, Shinya Arimoto, Natsumi Hayashi, Kenta Cobayashi and Daido Moriyama.
It is worth noting that the exhibition is organised by the Japan Foundation. It organises a variety of projects in three primary areas of activity: Arts and cultural exchange, Japanese-language education abroad, Japanese studies and intellectual exchange.
In the field of visual arts, part of our arts and cultural exchange programme, we strive to introduce art through reciprocal exchanges between Japan and other countries by organising exhibitions and projects to promote the activities of Japanese and foreign artists and other art specialists.
As part of these activities, the foundation has regularly organised travelling exhibitions, which tour foreign countries, these events are made up of works from the foundation’s own collection and deal with a diverse range of subjects including crafts; painting, photography, architecture and design.
The exhibition runs until March 30 in the headquarters of the Omani Association of Arts in Ghala from 6 am to 10 pm.
