NOTEBOOK：Arts Culture Tourism from Tokyo: Recent Episodes
SPINEAR
Welcome to NOTEBOOK, a cultural guide to art, design and architecture, along with local views and travel news in English giving a realistic view of Tokyo from two perspectives, one from Japan and the other from abroad. Get in touch: https://forms.gle/QL2V8eDgtskXefKo7 Instagram: @NOTEBOOK_pod Photo: Getty Images
The International Red Cross is planning to use AI developed in Japan to speed up landmine in parts of Ukraine. A team of Japanese scientists has said that it’s managed to built an original optical quantum computer. Japan has moved to the knockout stage of the FIFA Women's World Cup by defeating Costa Rica 2-0. And, the intense summer heat is expected to continue until October, according to a new three-month forecast by the Japan Meteorological Agency. With temperatures reaching a peak my the mid to late July, the back streets of Kagurazaka with its French community come alive between July 26 and July 29 during the Kagurazaka Matsuri, a summer festival east of Shinjuku and visit RootK Contemporary Gallery for their exhibition "Public Visuals". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Renowned Japanese author Seiichi Morimura, known for works including the novel "Ningen no Shomei" (Proof of the Man) and his nonfiction work "Akuma no Hoshoku" (The Devil's Gluttony), has died of pneumonia at a hospital in Tokyo aged 90. The head of a man found dead in a Sapporo hotel earlier this month has been recovered from the home of a doctor who was arrested along with his daughter on suspicion of murder. And a giant maze made from 50,000 sunflowers has opened in the city of Tendo, Yamagata Prefecture north of Tokyo. Meanwhile, the 57th Katsushika Noryo hanabi taikai, or fireworks festival, returned to the east of Tokyo for the first time in 4 years. Notebook visited and looked on as people clung to lampposts clambering to catch sight of the sky filling with explosions, one deafening boom at a time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Recent research shows the Japanese consumer will see the cost of over 30,000 food and drink items go up in price by October as retailers seek to protect profits. Hyper Japan Festival 2023 showcased Japanese culture in London last Friday, attracting upward of 30,000 people. A government survey last Friday showed a marked increase in the number of working women in Japan with a record 30.35 million in 2022, compared with 1.22 million five years ago. In Osaka, news is less promising as a delay in constructing foreign pavilions at the 2025 Osaka Kansai Expo site is casting an unsettling shadow over the event with spiraling costs and controversial appointments. Amid soaring temperatures and unpredictable weather both here and abroad, local weather experts recently called an end to the country’s annual rainy season which usually runs through June and early July. NOTEBOOK escaped the worst of the sun for the welcome seclusion of "Nominoichi", an old coffee shop (or coffee-tei) in Ikebukuro. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The Japanese government estimates the visitors between January and June exceeded 10 million, 21-times the number from the year before. This rebound saw international travelers return to Haneda Airport's Terminal 2 on Wednesday, following its three-year closure due to the pandemic. Meanwhile, Japan's prestigious Akutagawa Prize for Literature has been awarded for the very first time to a disabled author with Saou Ichikawa picking up the top prize. Across town and one of the largest festivals of the year took place at Yasukuni Jinja (Shrine) opposite Kitanomaru Koen, a national park also home to many of museums. Yasukuni and park are a short walk from the Imperial Palace which also descends into darkness as night falls while an exhibition by the New York based artist Tyler Cobern across town at Fig. in Otsuka centers around ideas of actual and spiritual darkness. Notebook visits Yasukuni late one afternoon and listens to the sound of summer and the few people there soaking up the sun. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
A parade of yamahoko floats passed through Kyoto on Monday during the city’s annual Gion Festival, held in all its glory for the first time in almost four years. Meanwhile, a man died after being run over by a dashi float on Saturday at the Hakata Gion Yamakasa summer festival being held in the city of Fukuoka, southwest Japan. Temperatures over the weekend soared, reaching almost 35 degrees Celsius in more than 150 different parts of Japan, with temperatures in one city reaching almost 40. And Saturday marked the 40th anniversary of the iconic Family Computer or Famicom, produced by Japanese video game maker Nintendo. With last weekend widely acknowledged to be the start of summer, with Gion matsuri in Kyoto, Matama matsuri at Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine and others this July, Notebook caught one bon odori dance and the sound of Japanese fencing, also known as kendo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Today is Marine day in Japan, a national holiday, and with that Notebook is taking a break and will return on Wednesday. In the meantime, we revisit last Friday's episode (07/14) visiting Nihonbashi to catch a glimpse of work by painter David Hockney in the run up to a major exhibition in the Capitol. All this prior to the Bon festival season in Tokyo and Gion festival season in Kyoto which both began last Saturday, as Kyoto filled with people and a flotilla of lanterns during the Gion festival's Yoiyama event in the city. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The current Chief Executive of Hong Kong has said that it will ban the import of Japanese seafood should treated water from the disaster-crippled nuclear power plant in Fukushima be released into the ocean. In Japan, so-called ‘Search Funds’ are helping entrepreneurs restart aging businesses. And the legendary manga artist Kazuo Umezz has been reunited with works drawn as a teenager and thought lost, years before making his manga-ka debut. And with wind chimes dotted throughout Nihonbashi for the “Eco-Edo Nihonbashi” project that runs until September, current art exhibitions like “Interconnection” at Mitsukoshi Contemporary Gallery and 'joiner' photo prints by David Hockney at Nishimura Gallery, opening this weekend alongside the David Hockney retrospective at Tokyo's MOT Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, it is the iconic Nihonbashi Bridge which joins past with present from old Edo to present-day Tokyo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The heavy rain which lashed northern Kyushu, south west Japan, caused the automaker Toyota to pause operations Monday at three of its factories. That same day, temperatures reached 36.2 degrees in Central Tokyo, the first time it has exceeded 35 degrees this year, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency. The weather even caused one ceiling painting at Sensō-ji in Asakusa to peel away over the weekend. Perhaps feeling the heat was one man who fell victim of a bar in Shimbashi that defrauded him and his credit card of almost 700,000 JPY or nearly 5,000 USD. One very expensive night out. And in the run-up to the Bon holiday season we revisit several of our interviews with key creatives in the Capitol. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Concerns in Japan are growing over a possible resurgence of coronavirus cases this summer. Suspicious objects were discovered by police as people observed a minute's silence where the former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated one year ago on July 8th. A three-day festival of Japanese culture began on Friday in Sao Paulo, attracting cosplayers and members of Brazil's Japanese nikkei-jin community. Meanwhile, Access Tohoku, a store selling popular food and other items from Japan's Tohoku region, is set to open in Singapore on July 19th. As this week builds up to the first of several O’bon festivals in the capital, we revisit one from last year in Tokyo’s Toshima ward and listen to the Bon odori dance in full-swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Notebook reaches 200 episodes! The system logging traffic coming in and going out of the central Japanese Port of Nagoya was hit by a ransomware attack on Tuesday, by the Russia-based hacker group LockBit. The International Atomic Energy Agency IAEA opened an office at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Wednesday monitoring the safe discharge of treated radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean. A river running Ikoma in Nara prefecture turned a bright green this week. And police arrested a 35-year-old man for stealing 1,500 Pokemon trading cards worth 1.15 million JPY (8,000 USD) from a store in Akihabara. With today marking 200 episodes of Notebook and the start of this summer’s Tanabata (or Star) Festival, we scan the art events happening this weekend — from Tokyo Gendai in Yokohama, to Tennozu Artweek at WHAT Museum, even Koji Nakano at XYZ Collective — and visit Kishimojin temple in Zoshigaya and its summer festival happening this weekend. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Heavy rain pounded Japan's southwestern Kyushu region on Monday, causing a bridge to collapse, with some 360,000 evacuating Kumamoto city. The record rainfall over the weekend has left one dead and another person missing, with the Japan Meteorological Agency warning of further landslides. And as the rain front, extending from western to northern Japan, moving southward, a ceremony was held in the coastal town of Atami on Monday to remember 28 residents who died two years ago following a major landslide. In Fukuoka, a local artist last week unveiled his first painted billboard in 20 years for the latest Indiana Jones film. And with storm clouds and wet weather enveloping the country, and Tanabata — the Star Festival — celebrated on Friday, July 7th, we visited the historic Zōjō-ji temple near Tokyo Tower, the day after the sky opened and erupted over most of Tokyo the night before. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The Mayor of Hiroshima Kazumi Matsui and the U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel signed a sister park agreement between the Hiroshima Memorial Peace Park and the Pearl Harbor National Memorial in Hawaii. The Japanese government issued a power-saving request for areas served by TEPCO. The Nakagin Capsule Tower Building in Ginza is given a new lease of life with one of its modular capsules added to the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. And while the Enmusubi Wind Chime Festival opened yesterday in Kawagoe, Saitama, the annual Uwajima Ushioni Festival arrives in the port city of Uwajima for three days later this month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Japanese toys, games and character goods, are to be exhibited in the Brazilian city Sao Paulo. The Japanese oil painter Gyoji Nomiyama passed away last week aged 102. Meanwhile, art exhibitions in the capitol continue unabated, from Christopher L G Hill’s “Turtle” at Goya Curtain, to “Distance from the Incident” at Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts, "Shinro Ohtake" at Ehime Museum of Art in Matsuyama (ending Sunday 7/2), and “Tameshigaki” (lignes de vies) an exhibition of paintings by Charles Munka at INS studio, new gallery in Shibuya. Speaking of Shibuya, CCBT, the Civic Creative Base Tokyo, is an art and culture center sponsored by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. It held a press conference yesterday introducing its newest creative director Hideaki Ogawa who spoke with Notebook about the challenges of running such a center in Tokyo. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
A man dressed as the Joker character was charged with assault and arson aboard a Tokyo train in 2021, charges he denies. Meanwhile, passengers temporarily fled the Yamanote Line on Sunday afternoon after several open knives fell on the floor of the packed train. Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki offered caution against the recent rapid decline of the yen. A major Japanese moving company has apologized after a prank video starring several employees went viral. And Notebook recently visited Izakaya ‘Hachinosu' in Matsuyama, Ehime, a short walk from Matsuyama's Okaido shopping street. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Giant panda cubs Xiao Xiao and Lei Lei turned two on Friday at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo. More than 700 people are preparing to run for election in Japan's so-called House of Representatives this coming autumn. Okinawa marked the 78th anniversary of the end of the Pacific War last week. Tokyo’s Narita Airport plans to raise surcharges for international passengers from September, and a think-tank in West Japan is planning to repurpose abandoned homes and rundown buildings by re-using their wood and shortcut the global strain on lumber. Matsuyama is the capital of Ehime prefecture on the main island of Shikoku. Notebook recently visited the city and rode the streetcar made famous by writer Soseki Natsume to visit the Dōgo Onsen public bathhouse. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Kansai Electric informed Fukui prefectural government of its plan to reactivate the No. 1 and No. 2 reactor at its Takahama nuclear power plant, north of Kyoto on the Fukui coastline. Organizers of the popular Awa Odori dance festival are offering premium seats each priced at 200,000 JPY (1,400 USD) for the annual festival held in Tokushima Prefecture this August. A box of 15 premier cherries known as “Aomori Heartbeat” fetched a staggering 500,000 JPY (3,500 USD) during the first auction of the season in Aomori prefecture. And with Baseball the national pastime in Japan, we visit Picotao and the batting cages of the Otsuka Batting Center in Tokyo’s Toshima ward for one final session before it closes on June 30th, and then head to gallery 4649 in Sugamo for a painting show by Yusuke Abe. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The distinguished novelist Yumie Hiraiwa, known for her “Kawasemi hotel” novel series, passed away earlier this month aged 91. Communities around Mt. Fuji are calling for a limit to the number of hikers ahead of this summer’s predicted climbing boom. The Japan branch of the International Association for Impact Assessment (IAIA) has heavily criticized the Tokyo metropolitan government for its plan to redevelop the Meiji Jingu Gaien district. And Kagoshima Prefecture held its first Spider Battle in four years, an event where two spiders battle it out on the end of a long thin stick. Tokyo's Okubo is a rich mix of Korean and Southeast Asian culture. Inexpensive areas during the early 80s, it's now regarded as Korean Town that is also home to a vibrant Muslim community. We walk along Ikemen Street towards Shin-Okubo Station on the Yamanote line. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui will head back to the ISS for 6 months in space later next year. An indoor amusement park featuring the world of Harry Potter opened at the former Toshimaen amusement park in Nerima on Friday. And finally, Japanese film director Sadao Nakajima, known for “Gokudo no Onnatachi”, “Nihon no Don” and “Jo no Mai”, died in Kyoto on Sunday aged 88. Shinjuku has long-had a history of counterculture, film and theatre. With Shinjuku's ni-chome, san-chome, and Kabukicho all within walking distance of each other, we wander through each district one evening as daytime ends and the night begins. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
An 18-year-old recruit shot and killed one of his instructors at a Self-Defense Force firing range in Gifu Wednesday morning. A special screening of Makoto Shinkai’s hit animated film Suzume no Tojimari (2022) took place at the Civic Hall in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture last month, in the same place that also makes an appearance on-screen. And Tokyo-based artist Yuko Mohri to represent Japan at the 2024 Venice Biennale. Back in Tokyo, an Hibiya with its bronze statue of Godzilla is not far from Hibiya Park, opened in 1903 and once home to the state wire service Domei Tsushin, . The park today is a far cry from the Hibiya Riots which began in 1905. Nearby, the Ginza Graphic Gallery hosts artist and illustrator Tadanori Yokoo with “My Black Holes” an exhibition of archive material from the 1960s to the 1980s which runs until June 30th. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Domestic producer prices increased for the 27th straight month, rising by more than 5 percent from last year. A Vietnamese student has been arrested on suspicion of cutting hair without a license at his Tokyo home, serving as many as 3,000 customers since April 2021 while raking in a tidy profit. Meanwhile, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government has labeled Shibuya’s Dogenzaka a ‘Townscape Regeneration District’ that is part of redevelopment currently taking place around the main JR station. And with this year marking the 125th anniversary of Philippine independence from Spanish colonial rule, Ueno Park last weekend played host to Philippine Expo 2023 with a three day festival coinciding with the country's June 12th Independence day. We drop in on Ueno Park, transformed into Manila for three days of celebrations. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
With travel to and from Japan increasing, concerns over a possible measles outbreak is prompting experts to recommend vaccinating against the disease. Two injured Ukrainian soldiers have arrived in Japan for medical treatment and rehabilitation at a hospital in Tokyo. The Japanese Industry minister met with local fishing representatives from the Tohoku region over plans to release treated water from Fukushima’s stricken nuclear power plant into the sea. Meanwhile, plans have been approved for Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako to embark on their first official visit to Indonesia later this month. And with a three-day festival taking place in Ueno Park dedicated to the Philippines (June 9~11), NOTEBOOK visited Ueno Dōbutsuen, Japan’s old zoo at the heart of Tokyo, mere minutes from the park and Ueno Station. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
More heavy rain is expected in Mie, with sandbags ready amid further threat of flooding. In Tokyo, a Japanese court has ruled that not recognizing same-sex marriage is “unconstitutional”. Meanwhile, Japan’s parliament is set to pass a bill this month aimed at promoting a better understanding of the LGBT community. And finally, the number of new COVID-19 cases has risen just one month after the country downgraded the status and severity of the coronavirus in May. As the weather in Tokyo remains wet and humid, we take a trip from one museum to another, from MOMAT, Tokyo's National Museum of Modern Art near the Imperial Palace, to the MOT, Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo and Kiyosumi Shirakawa in Tokyo's Koto ward. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The prefectural government of Saga unearthed a sealed sarcophagus on Monday at the Yoshinogari historical park in southwestern Japan. The Japanese government announced new plans on Tuesday to speed up decarbonization, generating 15 trillion yen (107 billion USD) and investing in hydrogen. The government also announced it aims to raise the proportion of female executives at companies listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. And on Monday, the Japanese-made SLIM lunar landing probe was unveiled at the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima before its maiden voyage in August aboard the H3 rocket bound for the moon. Ever since it opened in 1894, Japan’s gateway to the sea has been Osanbashi Pier, overlooked by Yokohama's Minato Mirai skyline. We visit one windy afternoon catching the sound of a Dragon boat race off in the distance. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Heavy rain lashed parts of western and eastern Japan last Friday, as warm and humid air from Typhoon Mawar flowed into seasonal rain as Japan’s Meteorological Agency warned of further landslides and flooding. Japan is aiming to be at the centre of the supply chain for the next-generation of semiconductors by ramping up its investment in the technology. Meanwhile, the Irish Film Festival in Tokyo was launched last weekend at the Kadokawa Cinema in Yurakucho. Just south of Tokyo, Yokohama Chūkagai has become one of the largest and oldest Chinatowns in Japan, alongside Nankinmachi in Kobe and Shinchi in Nagasaki. We pass through its red gates on a warm Sunday as restaurants fill and streets overflow with locals and visitors alike. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
With a week of back and forth, Mars was at its closest to Earth this week, while Furyu-odori folk dances were added to UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list earlier this week. And following Monday's note on Christo and Jeanne-Claude at 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT and Wednesday's note on the late film director Yoichi Sai, today's note reviews the exhibition series Roppongi Crossing at the Mori Art Museum, reflecting the back-and-forth of a post-pandemic world with the latest edition “Coming and Going”. And with that, every note this week also reflects on events and people looking for stability amid unstable surroundings.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Following World Cup news of Japan’s 1-nil loss to Costa Rica and other news suggesting World Cup frenzy is putting a strain on Qatar's camel industry, the Lithuanian filmmaker Jonas Mekas took place over the weekend with a day of film screenings at the University of Tokyo. However, attention turns to the late Japanese film director Yoichi Sai, best known for his depiction of Koreans living in Japan with his debut “Mosquito on the 10th Floor” (1983) a controversial landmark that describes the fall of a character upholding the law while consumed by vice and the changing face of contemporary Japan. For Sai and Mekas, the exploration of social outcasts were filmed in infinitely different ways, experiences that are thankfully being revisited and remembered. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
All eyes are trained on the middle east this year. The FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar is finally underway, while November marks the 100th anniversary of the British archaeologist Howard Carter breaking open the tomb of King Tutankhamen near the Egyptian city of Luxor. This year a Japanese research team concluded an iron dagger found in the tomb had, in fact, been forged from a meteorite. Meanwhile, west of Luxor and east of Qatar, the largest and only permanent artwork is being designed for the Abu Dhabi desert: The Mastaba, a project conceived in 1977 by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, the duo known for their environmental installations. Their final project is now on display at 21_21 DESIGN SITE at Tokyo Midtown until February 2023.
With a month to go before Christmas, an aquarium in Gifu is powering Christmas lights with an electric eel, while the oldest fossilized dinosaur eggshell in Japan has also been found nearby. And following Monday's note on Akira Kurosawa at the National Film Archive of Japan alongside news of Gateway orbiting the moon; and Wednesday's note on Velvet Overhigh’m d.m.x in Shinjuku, Super Dommune in Shibuya, and the lunar lander 'Omotenashi'; today's note looks at the art space Goya Curtain and painter Patrick Lundberg along with painter Shinro Ohtake and musician Yamataka EYƎ. As Puzzle Punks, Ohtake and EYƎ release their first album in 26 years. While all four tell tales of the unexpected triggering connections, some earthbound and some celestial.
A Japanese government panel of experts called for further tax hikes on Tuesday, urging the public to shoulder a heavier burden as Japan builds up its national defenses. Meanwhile, its space agency, JAXA, said Tuesday it’s given up landing the country's ultra-small probe on the Moon after communication with the lander failed following its launch last week. Back on Earth, Velvet Overhigh’m d.m.x, a bar in Shinjuku’s ni-chome, and Super Dommune, a live streaming studio and online channel across town in Shibuya’s Parco department store, aim to fill the communal void of space (or Social Distance) with something more intimate and purposeful.
Both Japan and the United States signed an agreement Friday to send a Japanese astronaut to Gateway, a lunar-orbiting space station to be built by NASA. Closer to home, Japanese documentary filmmaker Toru Kubota returned to Japan last Friday after being released from a Myanmar prison the previous day. And screenplays written by Akira Kurosawa are on display at the National Film Archive of Japan in Kyobashi, a display of artefact and historical record with scripts written for other directors and rediscovered unscreened screenplays that combined reveal the secrets of Akira Kurosawa, the screenwriter.
Exactly 100 years after Albert Einstein came ashore in Japan for the very first time, the Japanese government has announced that it will be readmitting foreign cruise liners following a 2-year ban during the pandemic. And following Monday's note on the Fugaku supercomputer and uncovering the Pompeii of Japan and Wednesday's note on film director Kazuki Omori and amphibious drones patrolling waters off the Senkaku islands, today looks to Kyoto this weekend with Art Collaboration Kyoto, Artist Running Festival as well as "50 Seconds" at Soda that channel innovation and invention to reach an international audience.
Underwater drones are being developed by the Japanese government to patrol the waters around the Senkaku Islands near Okinawa while renowned film director Kazuki Omori passed away after a period of illness. Known for writing and directing Godzilla vs. Biollante, 1989, and Godzilla vs. King Ghidrah, 1991, he began by adapting books by Haruki Murakami as well as writing his first film reflecting on his experiences studying at medical school.
The former village Kanbara in Gunma prefecture, originally buried by the volcanic eruption of Mount Asama in 1783, was shown to the public over the weekend. The Tenmei Eruption not only devastated the village but also remodeling the local landscape which has come to be known as the Pompeii of Japan. Meanwhile the Japanese Emperor and Empress on tour in Hyogo prefecture visited one of the world's fastest supercomputers, Fugaku, currently being used to study AI in the field of life science, predict future weather patterns and embrace the future of quantum computing.
Monday’s note reported on two pythons on the loose in Tochigi and “Documentary Dream Show” being screened at K’s Cinema in Shinjuku, while Wednesday’s note pictured inbound tourism, a lunar eclipse, and the first catch of winter snow crab this year. Today, however, looks at Sakumaseika, the 114 year-old confectioner known for its sweets in the Studio Ghibli film Grave of the Fireflies, which closes its doors next January. And two exhibitions — “Voix” by Gozo Yoshimasu at Take Ninagawa and “Copper Age 1978-2022” by Shinro Ohtake at Ginza Atrium, GinzaSIX — both exploring drawing as wild and untamed in their own unique way.
Japan aims to have inbound tourism recover to pre-pandemic levels by 2025, bolstered by upcoming events such as the Expo 2025 in Osaka and the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo that same year. The weak yen is also helping the economy, while the US midterm elections will point at how Japan's currency will fare over the next few months as investors buying the dollar are now frantically buying back the yen. And with yesterday's rare lunar eclipse, the winter dish of crab is back on the menu. Fishing bans have been lifted in the waters surrounding Ishikawa and Fukui prefectures and the Snow Crab is now returning to tables across the country as winter draws in.
Two pet African ball pythons are currently on the loose after being abandoned by their owner and released into fields in Tochigi prefecture, north of Tokyo. In Tokyo, “Documentary Dream Show” (Yamagata in Tokyo 2022) at K’s Cinema in Shinjuku features 45 films from the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival held last year online. Yamagata is further north of Tochigi and home to Asia’s first international documentary film festival, the first of which celebrated the 100th anniversary of Yamagata city in 1989. Since then, the festival has been held biannually during the month of October.
Seen next to Monday’s note on the 178 people all named Hirokazu Tanaka and Wednesday’s note on N.E.U.U., a new games centre in the shadow of Shinjuku's old Odakyu Department store, as well as the screening of Tsai Ming-liang’s 2003 film Goodbye Dragon Inn in 4K, today's news of yet more rockets fired from North Korea are a world away as Tokyo seeks to make itself a unique cultural center that stands apart from other global centers. Art Week Tokyo involves 51 galleries, museums, and experimental art spaces opening their doors to visitors over 4 days. One such venue is MOMAT, the National Museum of Modern Art in Takeshiba, now in its 50th year, hosting the retrospective of Japanese artist Shinro Ohtake.
XR, or Cross Reality, a new digital tool combining elements of virtual reality and actual reality, has been unveiled by the Odakyu Corporation in Shinjuku to showcase its redevelopment of the area and the old Odakyu department store on the west side of Shinjuku Station. Elsewhere, the 35th Tokyo International Film Festival draws to a close. Tsai Ming-liang’s 2003 film Goodbye Dragon Inn, showing as part of the World Focus section, reflects the state of contemporary cinema as well as the present day, while other films such as World War III (2020) by the Iranian director Houman Seyedi and Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani? (2006) directed by Shinji Aoyama hold a strange mirror to the world.
On the eve of Hallowe'en, a world record breaking attempt took place last weekend to gather the most number of people with the same name. All named 'Hirokazu Tanaka' the group even boasts former pro baseball player ... Hirokazu Tanaka ... amongst its ranks. On the other side of the city, national museums line Ueno Park, the first public park in Japan. One of these is the National Museum of Western Art, designed by French architect Le Corbusier. It recently reopened after several years of renovations restoring the museum to its former glory. Ueno Park is also dominated by the arrival of two new panda to Ueno Zoo, while celebrating 50 years since the first Chinese panda came to Japan.
Seen in the context of recent events — from Monday’s note on the 35th Tokyo International Film Festival and an upcoming new animated shorts festival at Shibuya’s Eurospace, to Wednesday’s note on a 400 year-old chisel recovered from within part of Daitoku-ji Temple, Kyoto — the purchase of five wooden "Brillo's Box" sculptures by Andy Warhol by Tottori prefecture for almost ¥300 million, bought in preparation for the new Tottori Prefecture Museum of Art opening next year, is causing something of a stir. Meanwhile, Damian Loeb "Still" at Taka Ishii Gallery and tomorrow's screening of "Event for Modified Man" (1976) by Australian artist Stelarc at the Keio University Art Center's Mita Campus in Tokyo both probe and amplify the best of what the city has to offer post-lockdown.
250 officials from more than 142 countries and regions, as well as eight international organizations, are gathering this week to announce their participation in the upcoming 2025 Osaka-Kansai Expo. And as Autumnal weather creeps in, fish from Yamato Raku in Shinjuku makes the experience of food like kaki (oyster) katsuo tataki (slices of raw seared bonito) age-ginnan (pan-fried ginnan seeds that grow from the ginkyo tree) and sanma-no-kama-meshi (a hot pot of rice and whole mackerel) all the more memorable.
A 400 year-old chisel has been found hidden within the Hoji building currently being renovated at Daitoku-ji Temple in Kyoto. This week also marks the start of the 35th Tokyo International Film Festival sharing its programme shared with “Kazuhiko Hasegawa and Director’s Company” and the 90th Anniversary of Toho Studios, both taking place at the National Film Archive of Japan, a festival of New Animated Short films from Japan around the world will be taking place at Shibuya’s Eurospace cinema from December 10th.
Seen in the context of recent events — from Monday’s note on growing financial hardship to Wednesday’s notes on the preservationist who plowed through a 600 year-old Japanese toilet with a 22 year-old car; the 100 Chinese Dragon gang members fighting in a French restaurant on the 58th floor; and the female boxer in film “Small, Slow But Steady” reflecting her faltered surroundings by shooting in 16mm film — Kyoto Experiment, Alternative Kyoto, and Art Collaboration Kyoto this October and November all combine local culture with technology and ask the difficult question; what can art contribute during periods of austerity?
A car driven by someone from the Kyoto Association for the Preservation of Ancient Cultures reversed into Japan’s oldest public bathroom or tosu, an important cultural property part of the Tofukuji Temple in Kyoto. And the day before, members of the Chinese Dragon gang were involved in a scuffle at a French restaurant on the 58th floor of a building in Tokyo’s Ikebukuro. The gang with ties to Japan and China live in limbo; gang-like but not gang-like enough, falling outside of organized crime laws and considered a nuisance more than a criminal element. Elsewhere, directed by Sho Miyake and previewed in Berlin earlier this year, “Small, Slow But Steady” (or Keiko, me o su-masete), from 2022, loosely adapts the novel Don’t Give Up (Makenaide) by Keiko Ogasawara, the first hearing-impaired professional female boxer in Japan.
With the number of corporate bankruptcies in Japan up by almost 7% from the previous year to just over 3,000 cases, the first increase in three years, the Toranomon-Azabudai Project in Tokyo reshapes the physical centre of corporate Japan to introduce green space, residential and shopping to the heart of the city. But how will it do all of this in a meaningful way? Time will tell, as the project is due to open next spring in March 2023.
Human remains have been discovered in hedgerow beside Osaka's popular amusement park Universal Studios Japan, while Thailand's AirAsia has carried out its first flight connecting Bangkok with Fukuoka as borders are relaxed and tourists welcomed into Kyushu, now a new major hub for tourists from South East Asia. Meanwhile, a new exhibition of little seen work by Dutch artist Daan van Golden (1936–2017) takes place in Tokyo. “Art is the opposite of Nature” at Misako & Rosen gallery presents the painting and photographs of "art finding" by van Golden, examples of his radical practice.
Military led authorities n Myanmar have sentenced the documentary film director Toru Kubota to 3 years for violating "communication laws", on top of a 10-year sentence he received the week before. In Japan, with the week yen and relaxed borders, explosive tourism is set to make its way into the country, while noppe stew makes use of left-over ingredients and vegetables, especially taro root, providing a hearty, economic alternative best eaten during the autumnal winter months.
Japan finally removed both its cap on daily arrivals and its ban on individual tourism yesterday, seeking to revive the country’s ailing tourist economy. Meanwhile, Tokyo’s newly restored Rikkyo Gakuin Exhibition Hall is open to the general public along other buildings on the Rikkyo University campus, such as the residence belonging to mystery novelist Edogawa Rampo and his storehouse of books next door which was transferred to the University in 2002 and designated a cultural asset of Tokyo's Toshima city in 2003.
Japan's Megumi Horikawa won the women's 63-kilogram division at the Judo World Championships in Uzbekistan on Sunday for her first world title, as Taylor Fritz held firm in a pair of tie-breaks Sunday to outlast tour rival and longtime friend Frances Tiafoe in a gripping all-American final at the Rakuten Japan Open Tennis Championships. And following the news that composer Toshi Ichiyanagi passed away last week, we look at several of the twelve films he soundtracked, from The World of Pulses Electronics and Living Organism (1962) to Farewell to the Summer Light (1968), Atman (1975), The Story of Big 1: Sadaharu Oh (1977) and the final film he was involved with Hokai-bito: Ina no Seigetsu (2011)
An anchor belonging to a Mongolian ship, part of a fleet attempting to invade Japan in 1281, was recovered from the sea floor off the coast of Nagasaki last week. Meanwhile the composer and pianist Toshi Ichiyanagi passed away aged 89. He was crucial part of the postwar Japanese avant-garde and worked in theatre and film with the likes of painter Jasper Johns, choreographer Merce Cunningham, Toshio Matsumoto and Yoko Ono to name but a few.
Yayoi Kusama's 'Pumpkin' from 1994 had been on a pier on the island of Naoshima jutting out to sea yet was washed away during a typhoon last summer. After being rescued by locals and repaired, the sculpture has now been unveiled and is back to its former glory. Nearby, the Okayama Arts Summit 2022 entitled Do we dream under the same sky, curated by Rirkrit Tiravanija, also considers community and participation as the triennale returns after its last edition in 2019 chose technology and fiction as major themes. There has been nothing imaginary about the past 3 years and this edition of the Art Summit aims to slow things down, and does so until November 27th.
The Crown Prince Akishino attended the 31st Blue Planet Prize award ceremony in Tokyo awarded this year to the the Fourth King of Bhutan for his promotion of culture and collective happiness along with Professor Stephen Carpenter from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the United States for his 40-year study of lake ecosystems. In Ehime on Shikoku, the warm waters of the Uwakai Sea, part of Japan's Inland Sea, provide an amply supply of fresh fish. While Ehime's west-facing coastline also provides the right setting for Shikoku’s famed dish of udon. Regular crops of chestnuts and barley are raw ingredients used in making raw yomogi udon, mixing local yomogi (mugwort) grown in the Hijikawa river of Ozu city with udon noodles; tarai udon and ankake-yomogi udon; two Chinese inspired dishes topped with fresh seasonal vegetables.
North Korean fired a ballistic missile for the first time in 5 years, traveling over Aomori to the north of Japan and then landing in the Pacific, 4,500km away. Meanwhile, Japan's oldest hot spring Dogo Onsen Honkan in Matsuyama City, Ehime, is currently being renovated but is open for business. It has served as inspiration and a setting for the writer Natsume Soseki and a festival celebrating Matsuyama hot spring culture, DOGO ONSENART 2022 features the 'honkan' (or main building) as its centre piece, wrapped with an enlarged collage of the local landscape, local culture and local history by the local artist Shinro Ohtake.
Swedish researcher Svante Pääbo, based at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology in Japan since 2020, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine on Monday for trying to extract DNA from 40,000-year-old bones, and unveiling the Neanderthal genome. Meanwhile, the National Film Archive of Japan in Tokyo will showcase films made by Kazuhiko Hasegawa and Directors Company, a little known of film production office that ran from 1982 to 1992 and produced Hasegawa's social satire The Man Who Stole the Sun (Taiyō o Nusunda Otoko) from 1979, starring the notorious Bunta Sagiwara as a police officer tracking down a terrorist and High School teacher — played by musician Kenji Sawada — building an atomic bomb to demand the Rolling Stones play Japan.
Kanji "Antonio" Inoki passed away last Saturday after being diagnosed with a heart decease several year ago. He came to be known for the unusual mixed martial arts contest with Muhammed Ali at the Nippon Budokan Hall in 1978, and later turned to politics, leveraging his influence in places such as Iraq and North Korea to negotiate the release of Japanese hostages and abductees. Yu Miri's own story is as a Zainichi writer of Korean and Japanese descent. Her latest book Tokyo Ueno Station won the fifth Berkeley Japan Prize last week at an award ceremony in California, and it tells the story of a worker from Fukushima looking for work in the run up to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and their later life as the 2020 Olympics Games are announced. Miri's champions the forgotten and disregarded in society, a tale that now resonates around the world.
China and Japan celebrated 50 years of diplomatic ties despite the recent strain over the Senkaku islands in the South China Sea and the issue of Taiwan. Meanwhile, Art Week Tokyo returns for its first full iteration following its soft launch last summer. The string of 50 of Tokyo's museums, galleries and art spaces are linked across 6 different routes throughout the city and the art week hopes to generate interest by introducing local artists to a more global audience and nurture the local scene by encouraging the conversation of art’s worth beyond its monetary value.
The American VP Kamila Harris meets with tech leaders in Japan to boost the manufacture of semi-conductors in the country ,while a new drone is being tested to deliver items to remote parts in Japan. And in the port city of Uwajima, Ehime prefecture, Kaminari serves a hearty lunch of kona-mono : Okonomiyake pancake AND a large bowl of udon.
Russia's FSB interrogate the Japanese consul in Vladivostok accusing the diplomat of engaging in espionage after obtaining classified information in exchange for money. All this as the state funeral for former PM Shinzo Abe takes place at Tokyo's Nippon Budokan Hall. It was originally built for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics to showcase the martial arts. The hall was based on the 'Yumedono', or Hall of Dreams, a similar octagonal structure at Horyuji Temple in Nara, played host to Muhammad Ali and the Beatles, and still serves as a religious venue for annual remembrance.
Tamawashi won this Autumn's Grand Sumo Tournament at Ryogoku over the weekend fending off No.3 Takayasu to become the oldest winner an Emperor's Cup while almost 38 years of age. And the day before, Genki Kawamura won 'Best Director' at the 70th San Sebastian International Film Festival in Spain for his directorial debut Hyakka (A Hundred Flowers) staring Masaki Suda, Mieko Harada, Masami Nagasawa, and Masatoshi Nagase.
A team of Japanese researchers are fitting cockroaches with solar cells to be sent on search and rescue missions, while never-seen-before silent footage shot by Tokyo's Metropolitan Police Department of the Beatles visiting Japan in 1966 has finally released albeit in censored form.
PM Kishida announces plans to remove the limit is on daily arrivals to Japan, while also removing the need for short-term travel visa as well as individual travel. And while Police unveil a new service whereby members of the public can share image and video of an incident on-the-fly, the skateboarding photography magazine Kawa views the world through the lens of possibility, valuing places that other people simply. The magazine has just launched its fourth issue and also has a photo exhibition at Studio 35 Minutes in Araiyakushimae which runs until October 1st.
A man self-immolates near the offices of the Japanese PM protesting the upcoming state funeral for Shinzo Abe. In Ibaraki, chestnuts are being picked as Autumn draws in. And with food in mind, the difference between Otoushi, tsukidashi, and sakizuke dishes disguise the start of every meal in a Japanese restaurant. We look at their differences and the way each connect with older forms of dining.
Typhoon Nanmadol moves on leaving a dangerous turtle free to cause havoc of its own. PM Kishida heads to the U.N. General Assembly while the Digital Minister Kono Taro is tipped to be the next PM as Kida's cabinet slumps even further among a certain portion of the electorate. Escape from al of this would seem the best option. But autumn is beckoning so now may be the last time to visit one of several Citizen Forests — Tomin-no-mori — outside Tokyo, leaving the city behind for several days to experience the wild in mild weather.
Typhoon Nanmadol batters the country and cripples travel throughout the region and wider country by rail and by air. Meanwhile, the National Film Archive of Japan celebrates 90 years of Toho Studios with the second part of a two-part season of films dedicated to the studio. From Sotoji Kimura's “Ongaku kigeki: horoyoi Jinsei” (1933) to Shiro Moritani's “Aka zu-kin chan, kiwotsukete” or Take Care Little Red Riding Hood (1970) suggests how the Toho Studio might of responded in later years to the changing cultural landscape, picturing the country’s mood, its sentiment, climate, even weather, expressing a cultural, generational and environmental change.
Typhoon No.14 also known as ‘Nanmadol’ approaching the southwestern region of Kyushu made landfall yesterday, causing havoc with trains and planes throughout the region but also across Japan. This year also marks the 30th anniversary of Kyushu-native Seicho Matsumoto (1909-1992), a mystery and suspense novelist well-known for his true crime dramatizations turned into extended television dramas from the 1960s onward. Upon his death, his Tokyo residence has transplanted to Kokura in Kyushu where he grew up and installed within the Matsumoto Seicho Memorial Museum.
JR Kyushu unveiled its new sightseeing train the Futatsuboshi 4047 which will run along the Nagasaki and Omiya lines in Kyushu. The service will start next week on the 23rd and also coincide with the opening of the West Kyushu Shinkansen Line. Meanwhile, artist Kazuna Taguchi also brings her exhibition “A Quiet Sun” at Ginza Maison Hermès Le Forum to a close, bringing life to dead images while scooping up references to other works, namely the Mnemosyne Atlas by the German historian and cultural theorist Aby Warburg. In the Renzo Piano designed Hermes gallery, her small photographic works ask a lingering question: What kind of images are produced by the setting sun?
As the Nikkei stock index plunged by almost 3 percent, and the yen fell to 145 against the U.S dollar, the wrestlers Mayu Shidochi and Nonoka Ozaki both claimed titles at the World Wrestling Championships in Belgrade. Less active but no less important, putting the world to rights over food and drink is the central reason for being at Stand Botefuri, a standing bar tachinomiya found in Tokyo's Jimbocho.
Japanese government mulls removing the entry cap of 50,000 foreign tourists per day. And Wakayama Prefecture harvests 150,000 tonnes of mandarin oranges known for ripening fast in Tanabe City. Jiyu Gakuen Myonichikan in Ikebukuro designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and Arata Endo in 1921 is also only one of two examples of Wright's work in Japan to completely retain its original appearance.
A portable tea ceremony takes place on Mt. Fuji marking the end of this summer's climbing season. In Mie prefecture, Maruyama's terraced rice fields hold 'Inekari-no-tsudoi', their annual get together for the first time in three years. Meanwhile, the filmmaker Masao Adachi plans to make a film centered around Tetsuya Yamagami, the man accused of killing the ex-Prime minister Shinzo Abe and release in time for Abe's state funeral on September 27th. Like Adachi's 1969 documentary AKA Serial Killer, this latest film will lean heavily on landscape: rural, urban, visual and political.
Daily infections in Tokyo fall below 10,000 while Emperor Naruhito expresses his intention to attend the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II at the age of 96 last Thursday. Prime Minister Kishida pays his condolences at the UK Embassy to Japan, while Katsuhiro Otomo expresses his love of writer Kido Okamoto (1872-1939) popular for his subtle style of introducing the 'other' into the background of Japanese literature and whose father worked as an interpreter for the Embassy's British Legation in Tokyo during the late 1800s.
As Pro-Russia Hacker group 'Killnet' attacks Japanese infrastructure and the number of permitted visitors into the Japan on any given day increased from 20,000 to 50,000, Onsen Confidential, an art festival with a difference, does its bit to boost the cooperative power of like-mindedness at home and abroad by kicking off the event with a one-day conference in the coastal resort of Atami, Shizuoka.
An office building collapses in Yamaguchi prefecture, trapping several people and injuring others. In Tokyo, the cost of the state funeral for the late Shinzo Abe is said to have swelled by six times its original figure. All of this as the price of fish has also gone up though this is due to rising inflation and the cost of gas and electricity. The chain restaurant Kura Sushi announced it would raise its cheapest dishes by 5 yen while reduce some of its more expensive lines by 55 yen in a move to manage costs and still retain loyal customers. All this happens as some fish are coming back into season following the relentless summer — from engawa to kohada, and amaebi to ikura.
Russia withdraws from the reciprocal visa-free program for Japanese residents to the Northern Territories as a former Dentsu exec receives yet another warrant for his arrest following further claims of Olympic related bribery. Meanwhile, we briefly look at the writer Sanjugo Naoki (1891-1927) whose name lends the Naoki Prize its name and whose tomb is now found at Choshu-ji Temple, in Yokohama not far from Negishi Bay.
The 'Kitano Goryoe', a ceremony happens at the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine in Kyoto for the first time in 550 years. And in Shiga prefecture, Burume-no-Oka Brewery holds hop-picking sessions for its locally brewed beer. In Fukushima's Sukagawa Archive Center is holding yearly special-effects workshops with the hope of finding the next generation of SFX artists like the legendary effects artist Eiji Tsuburaya (1901-1970), the "Father of Tokusatsu" who co-created Godzilla, was responsible for Ultraman and whose hometown is also Sukagawa City.
Typhoon Hinnamnor approaches Kyushu as Russia parades its military on the Northern Territories, islands near Hokkaido which Russia claims it owns calling them the Southern Kurils. And flooding in the Aomori city of Hirosaki has also devastated apple orchards there. But change is not limited to rural Japan. In Shibuya, the club Sound Museum Vision closed its doors this past weekend and Contact between Shibuya and Ebisu will also close later this month, all because of a project to redevelopment land in and around Shibuya Station, marking not only the changing face of Shibuya but also becoming the changing face of music culture in Tokyo.
With 2,000 pears stolen from a field in Shimotsuma, Ibaraki, and Japanese food company Meiji attacked by a ransomware virus in Singapore, the contemporary artist Taro Shinoda unexpectedly passed away at the age of 58. His installations, Kare-sansui, Abstraction of Confusion and Lunar Reflections, offered reflections of a series of phenomena from an artist concerned with now humans coexist with the natural world. Roppongi Art Night 2022 also considers who these two things might come together for three days later this month.
Kawasaki Heavy Industries, hope its new robot named Nyokkey will help compensate for labor shortages in the face of Japan's declining population. Japanese marine biologists managed to reach a record depth of 9,801 metres while studying the ocean floor. And in Iwate, the independent sake brewery Kiku-zakari, founded in 1894 and rebuilt following the 2011 earthquake, was named with a renewed sense of purpose in mind, determined to press ahead no matter what happens. Its two best brands of Junmai-shu sake, “Taxi Driver” and “Ya-kyoku”, look to Scorsese and folk songs for further inspiration.
Typhoon Hinnamnor, the 11th typhoon this year, heads towards Okinawa with a band of low pressure stretching as far as Tohoku and Aomori in the north of Japan bringing the promise of heavy rain and possible flooding to the region. Meanwhile, we briefly look at the writer Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1982-1927) whose name lends the Akutagawa Prize its name and whose tomb is now found alongside his two sons at Jigan-ji Temple, a small residential cemetery in Sugamo, Tokyo.
As the Federal Reserve continues to raise interest rates and the Japanese currency falls to 138JPY against the US dollar in response, a police box in the town closest to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant reopens for the first time in more than 11 years. Futaba town is also welcoming back residents despite still being declared a difficult-to-return zone. In Tokyo, cinematographer Seizo Sengen is remembered in a season a films being screened at Cinema Vera in Shibuya, having worked on classics like "Sailor Suit and Machine Gun" by Shinji Somai and “Satusjin Yugi” (The Murder Game) also by Tōru Murakawa, featuring the late and great Yutaka Matsuda.
Seven nuclear power reactors in Japan are potentially being restarted as new, next-generation power plants are also being considered to quell concerns over energy production in the country. Yet, bigger challenges exist in how best to manage waste from old power plants without the whole exercise becoming too costly. In Tokyo, there is no shortage of fiction. Both Junko Takase and Misumi Kubo, attended a press conference and prize-giving ceremony for this year's Akutagawa Prize and Naoki Prize for Japanese literature, Takase's short novel "Oishii Gohan ga Tabe-rare-masu-yo-ni” (To become able to eat delicious food) received the Akutagawa Prize and Kubo's short story collection "Yoru ni Hoshi o Hanatsu" (Releasing stars into the night sky) receiving the Naoki Prize.
In Yamanashi prefecture, Shine Muscat are being stolen from vineyards. So farmers there are looking towards drone technology and thermal imaging to thwart the perpetrator. And in Tokyo, photographer Osamu Kanemura pictures an urban landscape spinning out of control with his latest exhibition 'Sold Out Artist' at Cave-Ayumi Gallery. His uses video and sound not to reproduce a single image of the city but to trick the mind into thinking the city he sees is somewhere we might recognize, even remember. A playful proposition which, to paraphrase Ralf Hütter of Kraftwerk, is all about friendship and excitement — "we play with images [and] images play with us”.
Travel restrictions are slowly being easing, at least in terms of how many tourists can enter each day. from the current 20,000, 50,000 are expected to be allowed in each day. Travel will still be limited to tour groups but unescorted, giving some freedom to people wanting to wander. And with these incremental changes comes the hope that tourism can benefit more quickly. In Otsu next to Lake Biwa in Shiga prefecture, 'Shisei-an' is busy preparing Funa-zushi for the new year. The fermented delicacy is made from carp, or ni-goro-buna, that come from the lake. The dish is said to ward off ailments, even boost the immune system.
Amid rumors of bribe-taking sponsorship for last year's Olympic Games, hospitals fighting COVID-19 infection and a shortage of hospital beds and Ukrainians fleeing Russian invasion hoping to make Japan a permanent home, the Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel, north of Tokyo in the city of Kasukabe in Saitama, helps protect the local area and bolster Tokyo's defenses from local rivers and the Edogawa from bursting their banks at a time of worsening climate change.
Colliding cargo ships and tankers off the Wakayama coastline and new infections in the capitol holding steady around 25,000 offer an overview of current concern. But on Nakano-doru, just north of Shinjuku, plan-B, the alternative art space that may be the first of its kind in Japan, returns after several years in hibernation. Founded in 1982 by dancer Min Tanaka, the late Kazue Kobata and a group of others, the space “not owned by anyone, but managed by volunteers" has survived by asking one simple question: What is freedom?
Fireballs are seen over the skies of Kanto Japan and the Hitoboshi fire-spinning festival spins wheat over the Nanmoku River for the first time in three years. Elsewhere, a memorial archive in Ikebukuro dedicated to the mystery novelist Edogawa Ranpo is open to the public. It is where he lived until his death in 1965, and the studio includes all of his writings and personal effects, shedding light on this important mystery novelist responsible for classics like 'D-zaka no satsujin jiken' (The Case of the Murder on D. Hill), about about a woman killed in the throws of a sadomasochistic affair, and 'Ningen isu' (The Human Chair) about a man who hides within a chair to feel the bodies seated on top.
Kana Satomi aims to become the first female professional player of shogi, the Japanese board game of strategy and patience. 9 year-old Reo Fujita also turns pro but this time for Go, another board game of territorial possession and capture played throughout East Asia. In Niigata, the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale 2022 is currently underway having been delayed a year and features Ongoing Village based in Sansho House a 150 year-old wooden school found in the region's ‘satoyama’ — a zone bordering both mountain and farm land.
The Corpse flower, known for its foul smell, blooms for the first time in Niigata. In Tokyo, Digital Minister Kono Taro emulates Taiwan's own Digital Minister Audrey Tang by advocating for 'radical transparency' within government. But how will openness in government tackle borders into Japan that remain closed for most? With only 140,000 visitors admitted in recent months, the real challenge will be achieving an open border. Finally, the spirit horses made of cucumber and eggplant appear in households across the land, marking the end of the bon festival and the start of late Summer in Japan.
An off-duty policeman looses a file containing 400 names from an ongoing criminal investigation after some heavy drinking, while a warehouse fire rages on unabated in Ibaraki. With the end of summer in sight and the Ibaraki fire still blazing, we look at fashion designer Issey Miyake (1938-2022) who despite his image of glamour took inspiration from the subtly and precision of women like Japanese activist Fusae Ichikawa and Austrian born, British artist Lucie Rie.
Japan remembers Shū-sen kinen-bi, the Day the country remembers the end of the second world war, while people return from the summer Obon holiday. And with nature and nostalgia in mind Studio Ghibli and its Ghibli Museum is emblematic of this time of year. The one film which essentially formed the studio is also equally concerned with our relationship with nature and technology and how we yearn for the past, no matter how painful.
Heavy pressure: Typhoon Meari hit Tokyo over the weekend as the PM Kishida received a 4th vaccination, hinting at a broader programme of vaccination. And as one storm leaves, other enters. Amid resigning politicians, church scandals and psychic marketing, the Summer Sonic music festival readies its return with an international line up, only to then leave days later. In contrast, A store Robot in Harajuku is a shop's worth of music, art, and fashion in Tokyo that has been around for far longer than any music festival, weather front, politician or pandemic.
Fire breaks out for the second time this year at Taisho period-built Tanga Market in Kitakyushu destroying many of its shops including the Kokura Showa-kan cinema. And while Prime Minster Kishida reshuffles his cabinet to escape mounting criticism at his handling of political ties to Korean religious group, there are even more calls for him further reopen the country's borders to foreign tourism. Events like the international art fair STILL ALIVE: Aichi Triennale 2022 in Nagoya aim to bridge the gap while the country remains difficult to enter for the great majority of people.
Sunflowers at the Serakogen Farm near Hiroshima and in Kagoshima are in full bloom, showing support for Ukrainian nationals living in Japan. Meanwhile, Nagoya's Daijin, an izakaya in the city since 1907, and Ippachi Honten serving kishimen udon are hidden treasures amid this year's current Aichi Triennale and the World Cosplay Summit, both taking place in and around Nagoya's Aichi Arts Center.
Watermelons are ritually split in Obanazawa while Chrysanthemum flowers in Itoshima City, Fukuoka are readied for the upcoming Bon festival. Meanwhile, works of ‘procedural architecture’ by the duo Shusaku Arakawa and Madeline Gins explore ideas of life and possibility at the Aichi Arts Center for this year's Aichi Triennale in Nagoya. Their model for unbuilt project Bridge of Reversible Destiny from 1973-1989 is a rite of passage. And Reversible Destiny Lofts—Mitaka (In Memory of Helen Keller) from 2005, resonates with splitting fruit and floral tributes in the build up to Obon, a festival that bids one thing farewell, then welcomes something else in its place.
As the world's largest Buddha statue at Todai-ji in Nara is cleaned in readiness for the year ahead, the country remembers Nagasaki 77 years after the second ever atomic bomb used in aggression was dropped on the city. And after pioneering filmmaker Takahiko Iimura passed away last week aged 85, we take a brief look back at a film maker remembered not only for his abstract films but also for his association with groups like Fluxus and fellow artist Yoko Ono.
Captive audiences: Chinese military training exercises near Taiwan run the risk of straying into Japanese territory with islands near Okinawa looking on with bemused, concerned expressions. On the other side of the country, Fujiyama Records has been in Tokyo's Sangenjyaya for almost 40 years. It's caught between several roads and looks out across several pedestrian crossings. It's here that die-hard musicians like Yukio Sato, or members of Non-Band, all play impromptu concerts to passing traffic and a small, assembled crowd of fans who are either going about their daily business and crossing the street or hovering to catch sight of something extraordinary.
As stormy waters gather near Kyushu, a group of marine students from the nearby National Fisheries University discover a rare Ryugu-no-tsukai, or giant Oarfish, then promptly eat it. In some small way devouring their rare find makes sense. As the national obon holiday approaches — a chance for families to remember past relatives — a rare find such as this connects the present with the past, people with the fathomless sea, treating an extraordinary sight as an everyday occurrence. At Chiba City's Museum of Art, “Summer Vacation at a Certain Museum” is just that; a museum caught between the everyday and the extraordinary, at a time that’s a little different from normal — a time for smaller, more special experiences.
Crashing thunder, heavy rainfall, and river's bursting banks, the summer exodus has finally begun. Nebuta is in full swing as has been reported several times this week. Yet, amid all these atmospherics, a political storm is brewing too, near the Senkaku islands, a stone's throw from Okinawa and the northern tip of Taiwan. Nancy Pelosi had visited the island in her capacity as Speaker and third in line to the U.S. President. It has sent Beijing officials into a tiswas of acrimony and threatens to spill over into Japanese waters. Perhaps amid the madness, the annual summer festivals sending off dead spirits to welcome in cooler months, some calm can be found in food and song, from the Japanese work songs of 'Soran Bushi' to food made at COOK DAN, a curry shop in Hachiobori by chef and rapper Raita Danjou, providing rhythm and beats that bind work, the environment and nature to cool the mind and ultimately dispel conflict.
With the Morioka Sansa Odori summer festival in Iwate prefecture taking place along with Sendai's Tanabata festival in Miyagi prefecture, traditions from both of these festival converge on this week's Aomori Nebuta, a festival of giant mobile lanterns in Aomori city committed to bidding old spirits farewell and ideas of "sleep" passed along 6 generations of Nebuta-shi craftsmen.
August the 6th this weekend marks 77 years since the bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. To mark the occasion, the 1983 documentary "Tokyo Saiban" is being re-screened throughout Tokyo. Directed by Masaki Kobayashi, it was sourced from extensive film shot during the Tokyo Trials. However, this week also marks the beginning of the annual Obon holiday season along with Aomori's Nebuta festival, the first time in three years, all gearing up for the annual exodus to and from the capitol.
With old train stock on the JR Ube line in Yamaguchi revived amid a surge of new COVID-19 cases throughout the country, second-hand book stores nearest to stations remain a constant, dependable presence. Take Bohemian's Guild in Jimbocho for example, or Totodo in Shibuya. There is also Flotsam Books near Daitabashi station, SO BOOKS close to Yoyogi-Hachiman, Honk Books in between Kanamecho and Ikebukuro and Kongen Shobo near Ekoda on the Seibu-Ikebukuro line. After all, knowledge is power.
As a massive earthquake strikes the Philippines and Typhoon Songda blows itself out in the Philippine sea not far from Amami, Kyushu, and Okinawa, the second part of exhibition "Everywhere Gather Yourself Stand" continues at Yutaka Kikutake Gallery in Roppongi.
Mie Prefecture is hit by lightning, setting one house ablaze, while economic trade with Indonesia reconvenes. All the while, Lavender Opener Chair and the co-run diner Tohmei, both in Tokyo's Arakawa, present the latest farmed produce from Yamagata, north of Tokyo, riding out both economic and atmospheric storms.
As monkeypox reaches Japan and a rouge band of nihon-zaru, wild Japanese macaque, patrol the streets of Yamagata, the Tō-ji Buddhist Temple in Kyoto, built in the late 700s, marks its 1,200 year anniversary with a mandala painted by the artist Miwa Komatsu, currently on show at the Taro Okamoto Museum of Art in Kawasaki.
Sakurajima volcano blows on the island of Kyushu as independent cinema Iwanami Hall in Tokyo is days away from its final screening. Meanwhile, the National Film Archive of Japan celebrates 90 years of Toho Studios with “Yowa mushi chin-sen-gumi” (1938), “Kimi no namae wa” (2016), Ishirō Honda’s “Gojira” (1954) and Akira Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai” (1954) as well as “Nihon chin-botsu” (1973) based on Sakyo Komatsu's disaster novel Japan Sinks which pictures the country as it falls into the sea, beginning with an erupting volcano!
Japanese composer and musician Seigen Ono engineered early records by Ryuichi Sakamoto and Yasuaki Shimizu. His first album 'Seigen' was released on the ambient label Music Interior in 1984 and has since worked with theatre and ballet companies around the world. Yet it was one of his first jobs on arriving in Tokyo from Fukushima that introduced him to film and cinema. This week sees the Japanese release of 'BOX III', a box set of remastered films by film director Wim Wenders, containing Notebook on Cities and Clothes (1989), Until the End of the World (1992), Faraway, So Close! (1993), and Buena Vista Social Club (1999). The man responsible for mixing sound for each film: Seigen Ono!
Consumer prices go up once more as Chinese naval vessels sail around the Amami Archipelago, just south of Kagoshima in southern Japan. Meanwhile, the exhibition “Everywhere Gather Yourself Stand” at SCAI PIRAMIDE in Roppongi, one part of a wider exhibition, presents differing personal histories through found objects, heirlooms, paintings and short film.
As Osaka experiences a record high of infections and Tokyo looks set to follow suit, the izakaya Bacchus in Ikebukuro takes refuge below ground, surrounding itself in English football memorabilia and local baseball.
Tokyo announces that it will host the 2025 World Athletics Championships as Yuzuru Hanyu announces his retirement from competitive figure skating as he turns professional. Meanwhile, Intermediatheque in KITTE Marunouchi showcases a permanent exhibition of scientific & cultural heritage from the University of Tokyo alongside collections from around the country, collections of flora, fauna, archeological finds, even a skeleton from the world's largest crocodile.
While Sumo suffers a wardrobe malfunction, 23 year-old Abdul Hakim Sani Brown becomes the first Japanese athlete to reach the Men's 100m sprint final at the World Athletics Championships. And with the release of Hong Kong documentary "Blue Island" by Chan Tze Woon at Shibuya's Eurospace exploring protests both past and present, the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival which awarded Chan's first film the Shinsuke Ogawa Prize in 2017 screens a selection of documentaries on rural Japan this August in readiness for its next film festival in 2023.
Last week Saxophonist Akira Sakata (76) performed at his old school in Hiroshima, the city of his birth and where he saw John Coltrane play in 1966. The encounter inspired him to study marine biology at University before moving to Tokyo, playing for the likes of Shuji Terayama, and much on, later played with Chris Cosey from Throbbing Gristle. His latest record is a recording from 1986 of him playing with legendary drummer Takeo Moriyama and was release earlier this year. It was mixed by Jim O’Rourke and mastered by Martin Siewert of Austrian band Radian.
Amid the swelling cases of infection in Tokyo and the yen falling even further to a 24-year low, Kyoto's Gion Matsuri Festival roles into town on July 17th. Meanwhile, Reina Sugihara's "Frame," a solo exhibition of paintings at Misako & Rosen relays the painter's haptic sense of touch as Ryan Gander's "Killing Time" at Taro Nasu Gallery embraces their own uncertainty by hugging the life out of it.
Aomori’s Northwestern Regional Prefectural Citizens Bureau is soliciting "dreams" from the general public, saying, “we'll make your dreams come true!” Meanwhile, jazz pianist Yosuke Yamashita reenacts a performance from 1969 along with the Yosuke Yamashita Trio from their impromptu performance at Waseda University during the height of the student movement. The event was the brainchild of writer Haruki Murakami, who famously owned his own jazz bar. And in Shinjuku, far from jazz and even further from Aomori, the Eagle Suntory Lounge exists to service the hopes and dreams of customers from its basement bar, away from the falling yen and risk of increased infection.
Mt Fuji opens for the summer season to climbers and Aomori schoolchildren get ready for the annual Nebuta festival, both happening for the first time in almost 3 years. And while Kishio Kisho Kurokawa's iconic metabolist building the Nakagin Capsule Tower is almost gone, slowly demolished since last month, his other buildings in Tokyo suggest some of that spirit lives on in a different form.
The LDP consolidates its place in Japanese politics following last weekend's Upper House election, gaining enough of a majority within parliament to aim for constitutional reform. And later this month filmmaker Toshiaki Toyoda unveils his latest short film "Ikiteiru" (Alive) starring Kiyohiko Shibukawa. It's the latest part of his Ōkami series dedicated, in this age of Corona, to the Japanese wolf, an animal extinct since 1905 and worshipped during Cholera and Typhoid outbreaks in the late 19th century, and a film Toyoda hopes "questions the meaning of life in this day and age, a film overflowing with power."
For a country where political upheaval is unheard of, political violence is equally rare. Following the death of former PM Shinzo Abe, the mind turns to politician Inejirō Asanuma killed on the campaign trail in 1960 during a televised debate. And although unconnected, the Ikejiri-ohashi record store Omega Point near Shibuya stocks experimental, avant-garde music some of which stems from the same social, cultural period serving as a reminder; music to learn from.
Corona infections surge with the latest strain of Omicron, BA.5. While a newly refurbished Fukushima Prefectural Library reopens just prior to this weekend's Upper House election, And Fumiaki Nagao at 4649 in Sugamo, and ACCUMULATIONS at Aoyama Meguro in Nakameguro both champion art on the fringes.
Gangs are using Air Tags in Aichi to track the whereabouts of Police and three early paintings by Taro Okamoto have been unearthed in Paris by collectors. Meanwhile, Tokyo's infamous 'Kissaten' coffee houses like Nominoichi in Ikebukuro, the 'Jazz-kissa' DUG in Shinjuku and Rojina in Kunitachi are all places to avoid detection, rediscover the odd idea, or simply invent a new one.
As Typhoon 'Aere' rips through Kyushu, Shikoku and the Tokai region, the Tanabata festival, known for its Super Moon, is due to appear between July 6th and 7th. While, Shinjuku's Thermae-Yu or Super Sento public bath is open 24 hours, 7 days a-week so you can avoid the strong winds, heavy rainfall, even celestial bodies as you tend to your own.
Typhoon Aere approaches Kyushu as a team of researchers in the Beppu Bay Project close in on defining the Anthroposcene and the film OLD DAYS, winner of the Fukuoka Independent Film Festival 'Grand Prix' is released reliving the wild days of three fictional ex-bikers.
Osaka's Grand Kabuki Summer Festival and Funanorikomi hits the Dotondori river this month. Meanwhile, live music continues the traditions of Osaka's Minamihorie district where the Socore Factory live house reimagines its warehouse roots, calling upon the latest in streaming culture to reach its audience, still hesitant to revisit live music in person.
Some of Fukushima's Difficult-to-return zones reopen as daily COVID infections increase. Kogane-cho near Yokohama, home to Akira Kurosawa's film High and Low from 1963 and the fictional detective Hama-Mike from 1994, has experienced its own share of disasters, and is now home to the Koganecho Art Center community,
Japan announce the 2023 G-7 Summit will be held in Hiroshima and Peach airline resumes international flights to other parts of Asia. And as Shibuya cleans up its act, Tokiwa-Shokudo in Sugamo continues to serve Sanpei-jiru and sake around the clock.
Mask wearing is officially relaxed as the UK and Japan reaffirm their trade in produce from in and around Fukushima. Yet real hopes test with tourism, despite Tokyo Disneyland, for example, limiting its visitors. Closer to home, the As-Salaam Masjid mosque sits between the merchants and manufacturers of Okachimachi in Tokyo, and is topped with a Turkish dome made, incidentally, with the help of Tokyo Disneyland .
Summer in the city starts with a vengeance as extreme heat sweeps across the country. And with the heat comes Nobi (Fires on the Plain) a 2015 film directed by Shinya Tsukamoto which plays again across the country to commemorate the 77th anniversary of war in the Pacific. A talk event and new book featuring the director press home the point that war, regardless of the generation it touches first, needs remembering.
Enthusiasts and obsessives come in all shapes and sizes. Take tori-tetsu, a nationwide group dedicated to photographing trains. One small group in Tokyo have also arrested for stealing Lego. And then there is the age-old obsessive Mori Ogai who celebrates his 100 anniversary this year – a physician in the Imperial Japanese army who travelled to Germany and became one of the first to translate German literature into Japanese. And last but not least, David Bowie, who walked through Kyoto with photographer Masayoshi Sukita in 1980 who now happens to have an exhibition of pictures taken that day on display near Kyoto Station.
Okinawa marks the 77th anniversary of the end of war in the Pacific while Japan's Kashiwa naval vessel arrives in London. Keijiban is a noticeboard gallery in Kanazawa city currently showing work by Katinka Bock and UK music label 4AD finally releases the Japan-only compilation "Pleasures & Treasures" available only from Tower Records.
More currency news as the JPY keeps falling against the USD and books are finally closed on last year's pandemic-delayed Olympic and Paralympic Games. It is places like Shou-chan in Shiinamachi that serve the best fish, making everything else going on in the world seem unimportant, if only for a few very important hours.
A bumper crop of strawberries from Tochigi is overshadowed by inflation, while NATO decides whether to accept Ukraine's application for membership, and a building by British architect Nigel Coates highlights the often tense and strange relationship between Russian and Ukraine embassies in Tokyo.
Earthquakes hit Ishikawa as Action 4 Cinema in Tokyo strives to champion diversity in the Japanese film industry.
Hybrid Economies: Toyota's EV technology and the upcoming Linear Shinkansen train line come under inspection, while nominees for this year's Akutagawa and Naoki Prize for Japanese literature are announced, each award dominated by a strong selection of female writers.
Police tackle a suspect nailing straw dolls to a sacred tree and monitor the campaign trail for an upcoming election. All this alongside painting shows by Gerhard Richter at MOMAT, Ryuichiro Otake at Hagiwara Projects and Richard Aldrich at Misako & Rosen in Otsuka.
With reopening borders, the rules of etiquette for mask wearing here in Tokyo are best described as vague. Even advocates are having doubts. However, the clearest example often comes from eating out. Places like Oban-zushi in Kabukicho show that mask wearing is about keeping others comfortable, 'masking' the distance between people without drawing attention to it.
With a faltering start, the border open for some tourists but not without additional red tape. Meanwhile, an old apartment building home to Astro Boy's creator Osamu Tezuka has opened to celebrate his work, the work of others, as well as a quiet, suburban part of the city, post-pandemic.
Cinemas and Summits: With the Asia Security Council having met last weekend we look at several independent cinemas in and around Tokyo that have been screening the latest films and documentaries from around Asia in Japan.
Asteroids and Chirashi: As news of what the Hayabusa2 space probe found buried in an object floating out in space is revealed, a new book on Japanese Punk uncovers a counterculture found here on Earth.
Alchemy, turning lead into gold, is where the future lives. Like the cost of domestic oil and gas, the price of Philippine Bananas has also gone up. And as unsuspecting Japanese holiday makers return home to find their gates missing and sold for scrap, the artist Mika Tajima considers the translation of an idea into diverse material, pondering what it means to be human.
Well-known Chinese restaurant Heichinro calls it a day as FINGER IN THE SOUP, an artist-run diner in Tokyo's Kichijoji, revisits the experience of traveling abroad.
As challenging weathers descend upon Japan, and rural areas slowly come back emerge from lockdown, sustainability and recombinant fabric have come to describe the way old things are now being put to good use, meeting the challenge of an ever-changing landscape.
As infection rates slow down, attention turns to an economy desperate for foreign custom. Meanwhile, the wider region wrestles with new infections by protesting at signs of foreign alliances. Conversely, new Japanese films respond wearily to all this with their take on old sci-fi characters, a rediscovered classic from Tashio period cinema feels as relevant today as it ever did, and an old cinema house prepares to bid farewell with a documentary on walking, to reveal strange, unusual tales of a world to those who willingly travel on foot.
As Japan's border show signs of opening it still remains off-limits to the vast majority of potential visitors. We look at who is affected along with live music, all searching for ways to be "borderless" amid division.
Welcome to NOTEBOOK; a quick guide to art, culture, and tourism in Tokyo. Everyday around this time from Monday to Friday we will bring news and views from around Japan. It will be a list of personal interests, everything from music, to art, to books and the wider culture at play. And as the prospect of travel draws ever closer, we’ll also note changes at the border, at the airport, at the hotel, and at home, as and when they happen.