“Modernity and Nostalgia: Woodblock Prints by Toyohara (Yoshu) Chikanobu” at the Morikami Museum

Related Content

• Another New Year's Party
  January 5, 2012
• Bon Festival Is Saturday at Morikami Museum & Japanese Gardens
  August 10, 2011
• Yes, Those Are the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds Flying Over Fort Lauderdale
  April 27, 2012
• Cos It’s My Hatsume, and I’ll Play If I Want To
  March 17, 2011
• Wacky Japanese Snacks At Morikami's Hatsumi Fair This Saturday
  March 18, 2011

More About

• Commodore Matthew Perry
• U.S. Navy
• Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

Like this Story?

Sign up for the Events Newsletter: What's happening in town? From underground club nights to the biggest outdoor festivals, our top picks for the week's best events will always keep you in on the action.

Privacy Policy Cancel Continue

In 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry of the U.S. Navy sailed into Tokyo Harbor, pointed his cannons at the city, and warned that if he wasn’t allowed ashore, and if the Japanese didn’t sign up for global trade, he’d open fire indiscriminately. It was classic American pirate diplomacy. The Japanese caved, and in came a flood of Western fashion, commodities, and sensibilities. The hermetic, feudal shogunate transformed, nearly overnight, into one of the most modern empires on Earth. That breakneck transition from the samurai to the Meiji era is chronicled in the Morikami Museum’s 60 exquisite, painstakingly detailed woodblock prints by Toyohara Chikanobu, who, starting in the late 19th Century, depicted both Kabuki characters and sensational yellow-news stories, old samurai battles, and the clash of mechanized armies in the Russo-Japanese war. Chikanobu pivoted between the ancient and the modern: At first glance, the women in a print called “Western Clothing” seem to be wearing bright-colored, traditional kimonos, but look closer and you notice that they’re decked out in the bonnets and corsets of a Southern belle. Today, Japan has, with its gadgets and fetishes, almost exceeded American modernism. But in Tokyo Harbor, there’s still the ruin of an unsuccessful island fort built to keep the Americans out.
Tuesdays-Sundays. Starts: Jan. 26. Continues through Feb. 20, 2011