The Cultural Organization of Athens Municipality, the Greek-Japanese Chamber of Commerce and the Embassy of Japan, are co-organizing an exhibition of the Japan Foundation, based on Japanese ukiyo-e prints by Toshusai SHARAKU, who lived and created during the Edo Period (1603-1868). His works picture mostly actors of Kabuki Chorodrama, warriors and Sumo wrestlers.

The exhibition will take place at the "Melina" Culutral Hall of the Athens Municipality (66, Iraklidon str., Thission), July 5-25, 2007.

Sharaku managed to express the inner world of the figures appearing iin his works, moving a step forward by using deformed visages and exaggerated expressions, in an age when actor prints were simply bromides that agreed with the tastes of the common people of the day. The 4 elements on which he is focusing are: hands, face, chest and black mica background.

Works by Sharaku are hosted in various important museums golabbly, such as the Birtish Museum and the New York Metropolitan Museum, while the National Museum of Tokyo has characterised his works as "Important Cultural Propertty".

Apart from the original copies of Sharaku's works, the exhibition includes works of 11 contemporary artistswhich compose Interpretetions, inspired by the works of Sharaku. The artists had to confort Sharaku two hundred years after his time.

This exhibition also wishes to illistrate the conncetion between ukiyo-e and the graphic design of Japan, the differences between the approaches used in graphic design and contemporary art,  and the diversity of today's artistic expression that cannot be simply grouped under the singles heading of "contemporary art".

The star of the exhibition is of course "Sharaku", who inspired the ideas and the rich imagination of the participating contemporary artists. This "collaboration" of Sharaku and the contemporary artists, which crosses temporal boundaries, is an experiment in the connection of the past and present of Japanese art.
This Exhibition is divided in three sections, "Reproduction of Sharaku", "Sharaku in gRaphic Art", and "Hommage to Sharaku". It includes 81 works (photography, painting, ceramics, printing and music), 28 original copies of Sharaku works, 28 graphic art works and 25 works of other works of art. 

Sponsors of the Exhibition is ELVAL S.A. and Kanebo International

(For further information please contact the GJCC at 210 32 32 586) 

source: Greek-Japanese Chamber of Commerce