Lecture: The Five Directions: Lacquer Through East Asia (Dr. Einor K. Cervone)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO1yxndxZ5s In this January 18, 2023, JASA lecture, Einor K. Cervone, PhD, Associate Curator of Asian Art at the Denver Art Museum, reexamines narratives of lacquer development in the East Asian region, as explored in the exhibition The Five Directions: Lacquer through East Asia, which opened December 18, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). What was it about lacquer that made it…

Lecture: Clay as Soft Power: The Rise of Shigaraki Ware in Postwar America (Dr. Natsu Oyobe)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2zeWg4k-0g Our final program of 2022, on December 5, featured Natsu Oyobe, Ph.D., curator of Asian Art at the University of Michigan Museum of Art. Specializing in modern and contemporary Japanese art, Dr. Oyobe has curated numerous Japanese art exhibitions, including Wrapped in Silk and Gold: A Family Legacy of 20th-Century Japanese Kimono (2010), Mari Katayama (2019), and Clay as Soft Power: Shigaraki Ware in Postwar America and Japan (2022). She is also…

Lecture: Industry and Institutions: Woodblock Prints and the Meiji Cultural Imagination (Dr. Alison J. Miller)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezZHh3JuDuA This November 8, 2022, talk by Alison J. Miller, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Art History and Director of Asian Studies at the University of the South (Sewanee, Tennesee), provides an introduction to the woodblock prints of the 1870s and 1880s with a focus on how the images worked to create and reinforce social conceptions of Meiji values and ideals. During the early Meiji period…

Lecture: Postwar Japanese Photography from 1945–1980 (Dr. Maggie Mustard)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAoo84xkIgc In this September 29, 2022, lecture, Maggie Mustard, PhD, presented a history of postwar Japanese photography from 1945 to 1980, focusing on the major themes and practitioners at the heart of the media’s development following the end of the Second World War. Dr. Mustard introduced the central questions that photographers were asking in the immediate postwar moment—what does “realism” mean for a photograph? Should…

Lecture: Kimono Style (Dr. Monika Bincsik)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtPR0nRY8gY For those members who could not participate in our June 28, 2022, in-person tour of the exhibition Kimono Style: The John C. Weber Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, on August 24, we offered this Zoom webinar with Monika Bincsik, Diane and Arthur Abbey Associate Curator for Japanese Decorative Arts at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Dr. Bincsik shared her curatorial…

Lecture: Listening to Clay: Conversations with Contemporary Japanese Ceramic Artists

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHcn4cpkadA This May 10, 2022, talk with Alice North and Louise Allison Cort presents a new book, Listening to Clay: Conversations with Contemporary Japanese Ceramic Artists, by Alice North, Halsey North and Louise Allison Cort. The book tells the stories of 16 revered Japanese ceramic artists in their own words. These celebrated artists with unparalleled skill and creative brilliance range in age from 94 to…

Lecture: Samurai Splendor: Sword Fittings from Edo Japan (Markus Sesko)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BydORXLgx1U This April 28, 2022, talk by Markus Sesko, Associate Curator of Asian Arms and Armor at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, introduces the museum’s extensive Japanese arms and armor collection and discusses the newly opened exhibition Samurai Splendor: Sword Fittings from Edo Japan, on display until spring 2024. This exhibition explores the luxurious aspect of Edo-period sword fashion, a fascinating area of Japanese arms…

Lecture: Reflections of a Collector: George Mann

https://youtu.be/yVuYL61bn1U On March 20, 2022, the keynote address of the Japanese Art Society of America annual meeting was delivered by the well-known ukiyo-e collector George Mann, who spoke about extraordinary prints and legendary figures in the Japanese print world. View more lecture recordings

Lecture: Avant-Garde Calligraphy and Zen between Postwar Japan, Europe, and the United States (Dr. Eugenia Bogdanova-Kummer)

https://youtu.be/Ka66JoDCORM (This talk recording is audio only!) On February 9, 2022, Dr. Eugenia Bogdanova-Kummer presented a talk on postwar Japanese calligraphy. Based on her recent book Bokujinkai: Japanese Calligraphy and the Postwar Avant-Garde,  she introduced the Kyoto-based avant-garde calligraphy group named Bokujinkai, and explored their international trajectories. Bokujinkai—or “People of the Ink”—was a group formed in 1952 by five calligraphers: Morita Shiryū, Inoue Yūichi, Eguchi…

Lecture: The Japanese Buddhist World Map: Religious Vision and the Cartographic Imagination (Prof. Max Moerman)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUA-qsV5BTc On January 11, 2022, Professor Max Moerman presented a talk on the specialized subject of maps in Japanese Buddhism. From at least the 14th through the late 19th century, Japanese monks have created and used maps to construct, represent, and find their place in a Buddhist world. Such maps provide a spatial history of religious thought, inform intellectual orientation and cultural identity, and reveal…