News Release
ATZ210807̲E̲E

August 7, 2021
Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation

Jam Session: The Ishibashi Foundation Collection×Morimura Yasumasa

Mʼs Gift of the Sea: Auto-Mythology
October 2 (Sat.), 2021 ‒ January 10 (Mon.), 2022
For our second Jam Session collaboration between the Ishibashi Foundation Collection andcontemporary artists, the featured artist is Morimura Yasumasa. Morimura will present ten of
his latest major works, created in response to Aoki Shigeruʼs A Gift of the Sea. In these originalworks, Morimura, acting alone, performs eighty-five individuals telling their stories. Thosetales are from the Meiji(1868-1912), Taisho(1912-1926), and Showa(1926-1989) periods, thepresent, and the future, creating in effect a picture scroll that asks where we have been, wherewe are going, and what is the end of history?

MORIMURA Yasumasa, Auto-Mythology, 2021 (video) ★

The Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation (Director: Ishibashi Hiroshi) is delighted toannounce its upcoming exhibition, Jam Session: The Ishibashi Foundation Collection×Morimura
Yasumasa Mʼs Gift of the Sea: Auto-Mythology.
Jam Sessions are joint performances by the Ishibashi Foundation Collection and contemporary
artists. For our second session, we welcome Morimura Yasumasa. Since 1985, when heproduced a self-portrait photograph in which he had dressed himself to resemble van Goghʼsself-portrait, Morimura has continued to create self-portrait-ish works in which he disguises
himself as the person in a painting or photograph, choosing sources from diverse periods andcultures and recreates it, adding his own interpretations.
Morimura has long had a secret love of the works by Aoki Shigeru and has created worksinspired by Aokiʼs Self-Portrait (1903) and A Gift of the Sea (1904) in the Ishibashi FoundationCollection. For this Jam Session, Morimura addresses A Gift of the Sea anew, head on. He gives
shape to the history of the many changes in Japanese culture, politics, and thought since theMeiji period, when Aoki created that work, in his own Morimura-style A Gift of the Sea-Mʼs Gift ofthe Sea. He has elevated his ardent feelings for Aoki into a new series of works.
This exhibition will consist of about ten works by Aoki from the collection and about sixty works
by Morimura. Of them, more than fifty are new works Morimura created for this exhibition. Thissession will be a never-before occasion with Morimura and Aoki performing.
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Exhibition Highlights
1. Nearly all of the Morimura works on display are new works
This exhibition includes more than fifty new works ‒ photographs and videos of Morimura
dressing himself to resemble Aokiʼs self-portraits and depictions of characters from A Gift of theSea, plus studies and dioramas, all created for this exhibition.

2. Morimura Yasumasa explores Aoki Shigeru
Through his own original art, Morimura interprets and comments on masterpieces by Aoki
Shigeru from the museumʼs collection, including A Gift of the Sea and Paradise Under the Sea(1907). Morimuraʼs Mʼs Gift of the Sea is based on his careful research on Aoki.

3. Large-scale Installation
Morimuraʼs Mʼs Gift of the Sea comprises ten variations on Aokiʼs A Gift of the Sea, exploring
variations in Japanʼs culture and history in periods ranging from Meiji, Taisho, and Showa to thepresent and the future. Eighty-five individual characters appear in them. The ten versions of Mʼs
Gift of the Sea, each 3 meters wide, are arranged in a circle in this large-scale installation.

The Ishibashi Foundation Collection
The Ishibashi Foundation Collection began as the personal collection of Ishibashi Shojiro, its
founder, and is now owned by the Ishibashi Foundation, which continues those collecting
activities. Presently consisting of about 2,800 works, the collection spans Western paintings,
modern Japanese-style paintings, sculpture and ceramics from East and West, and Chinese andJapanese calligraphy and paintings, as well twentieth century and contemporary art.

Jam Sessions
The Jam Sessions embody Experiencing Creativity, the concept guiding the Artizon Museum.
For Jam Sessions, artists and curators working together organize exhibitions with new works
inspired by specific works in the Ishibashi Foundation Collection and sessions in which thecollection and the artistʼs works interact to create new points of view. Our goal is a project thatwill be a bridge past and present and lead on to the future. The museum plans to hold a Jam
Session every year.
MORIMURA Yasumasa
Born in Osaka in 1951. Since his debut in 1985 with a portrait photograph of himself disguised asvan Gogh, Morimura has shown works in Japan and abroad. Served as artistic director for the 2014
Yokohama Triennale. Recent solo exhibitions include The Self-Portraits of YASUMASA MORIMURA:My Art, My Story, My Art History (National Museum of Art, Osaka, 2016), Yasumasa Morimura: Ego
Obscura, Tokyo 2020 (Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, 2020), and Morimura Yasumasa: Wantto change the world? Be seriously unserious (Toyama Prefectural Museum of Art and Design,2020). In 2018, opened Morimura @Museum in Kitakagaya, Osaka. His many publications include
Jigazõ no yukue (Whither the self-portrait; Kobunsha Shinsho).

AOKI Shigeru

Portrait photograph ofBorn in Kurume, Fukuoka prefecture, in 1882 and died in 1911. One of the most significant
Western-style painters of the Meiji period, he made his debut in 1903 with a group of works on
mythological subjects while still a student at the Fine Arts School. The following summer, he, hisfriends Sakamoto Hanjiro and Morita Tsunetomo, and his lover Fukuda Tane stayed in a fishingvillage on the Boso Peninsula (currently Tateyama, Chiba prefecture). His imagination stirred by
the story of the large catch of fish that his friends saw, Aoki created A Gift of the Sea, a major work.
The superb conceptual power and bold style of that painting attracted great interest, evoking astrong response, including arguments over whether it was finished or not. This exhibit of Aokiʼsmasterworks includes Self-Portrait from 1903, the year of Aokiʼs debut, and Onamuchi-no-mikoto(1905) and Paradise Under the Sea, both paintings inspired by Japanese myths.

Aoki Shigeru, 1907

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Composition of the Exhibition
Introduction: Gazing atMe.

Aoki Shigeruʼs self-portraits and portrait photograph go face-to-facewith works by Morimura in which he is disguised as Aoki.
Left: Aoki Shigeru, Self-Portrait, 1903
Right: Morimura Yasumasa, Self-Portrait/Youth (Aoki), 2016/2021★

Part 1: Appreciating A Gift of the Sea
Aokiʼs A Gift of the Sea and works related to the sea and myths are displayed.
Morimura introduces them with his own interpretations of the works and additional comments.

Left: AOKI Shigeru, Seascape, 1904
Center: AOKI Shigeru, A Gift of the Sea, 1904
Right: AOKI Shigeru, Paradise under the Sea, 1907

Part 2: Researching A Gift of the Sea
This section introduces the process through which Morimura created a series of ten works on the theme ofA Gift of the Sea through sketches, other materials, and a documentary film.

Left: MORIMURA Yasumasa, Study for Mʼs Gift of the Sea (Color Matching01: Creation of an Appearance), 2020
Right: MORIMURA Yasumasa, Study for Mʼs Gift of the Sea (Color Matching02: And Then), 2020

Left: MORIMURA Yasumasa, Study for Mʼs Gift of the Sea (Color Matching05: Virus: The Day of Resurrection, 1), 2021
Right: MORIMURA Yasumasa, Study for Mʼs Gift of the Sea (Color Matching06: In Our Time), 2021

Part 3: Variations｜Mʼs Gift of the Sea: Transforming
A picture-scroll-like world reflecting life from the Meiji period
to the twenty-first century expressed as a series of ten works
̶Variations｜Mʼs Gift of the Sea: Transforming.
CG image of the site, Hiroshi Yoshino Architects

Part 4: Auto-Mythology
Screening of a video of the Auto-Mythology that Morimura disguised as Aoki.

MORIMURA Yasumasa, Auto-Mythology, 2021 (video)*All of the works by Aoki Shigeru and portrait photographs of him are from the Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation Collection.
All the works by Morimura Yasumasa are property of the artist.

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Exhibition Overview
Exhibition title:

Jam Session: The Ishibashi Foundation Collection×Morimura Yasumasa
Mʼs Gift of the Sea: Auto-Mythology

Organized by

Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation

Cooperated by

Shashinkosha inc., Chishima Real Estate Co., Ltd., DNP Media Art Co., Ltd.,

Venue:

Artizon Museum, 6F Gallery

Nikon Imaging Japan inc.
Exhibition period:

October 2 [Sat], 2021−January 10 [Mon], 2022

Opening hours:

10:00 ‒ 18:00 (until 20:00 on Fridays)

Closed:Mondays (except Jan.10), Dec. 28 to Jan. 3*Last entry 30 minutes before closing.
Admission (incl.tax):

Designated entry system by date and time
Online ticket: 1,200 yen
Same day ticket (on sale at museum): 1,500 yen
Students Free entry (Advance online booking required.)*This admission fee gives the visitor access to the concurrent exhibition.
*Same day tickets on sale at the museum are available only for time slots thathave not reached full capacity.
*Advance booking is not required children up to junior high school.

Curators:

TADOKORO Natsuko, ITO Eriko

Concurrent Exhibition:

Selections from the Ishibashi Foundation Collection
The Impressionists: Tales of Painterly Friendships
Special Section: France and Wine in the 20th Century, in Illustrated Books*The exhibition detail is subject to change without notice.
Artizon Museum
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Tel. Domestic: 050-5541-8600 International: 047-316-2772 (Hello Dial)
www.artizon.museum
Directions: 5 minutes on foot from JR Tokyo Station (Yaesu Central Exit); Tokyo Metro Ginza Line Kyobashi
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