I am infatuated with Japanese culture in its food, aesthetic and art. Japanese cultural tradition is composed primarily of two ideals, impermanence, and self-cultivation. Impermanence is the idea that everything is subject to change, like the weather, and nothing remains the same forever. Reality is constantly changing in the people we know, the knowledge we retain and who we become. Self-cultivation is the second ideal, which deals with the ways of living,   The idea of impermanence was reflected in the gallery Yasumasa Morimura: Ego Obscura at the Japan Society.

Upon entering the Japan Society, we were greeted by a still bonsai tree sitting on top of rocks near a body of streaming water. This set the atmosphere for the gallery that we later visited upstairs. The tree represented us in the way we stay stationary amidst the flow of water(change in environment) around us. Everything changes.

I enjoyed Yasumasa Morimura’s Japanese take on popular art pieces in Western Culture. Morimura’s take on Andy Warhol showed the significance of pop-art and how it translates through all cultures in the world. I was particularly taken aback by his iteration of Vincent Van Gogh’s self-portrait. The blue paint strokes captured the same sadness and gloom that the original painting did. The man in the portrait maintains a stern stare while basking in the depth of blue. The painting exudes a feeling of isolation and sadness. Perhaps the man in the portrait has experienced the death of a relative or significant other. Maybe he is lost in thought of what the future holds for him. The idea of impermanence is also relevant in this painting. The man might be so caught up in his current situation of sadness so that he forgets that life will eventually change. He will no longer be sad and will come to the epiphany that love and life are not everlasting. The green walls accentuate the stillness of the portrait and other paintings in the gallery. It allowed me to take my time viewing each painting meticulously as if I was moving in slow-motion.

I was not able to stay awake for the short film that was being played in the room adjacent to the gallery but I did gather a few opinions of it before nodding off. Japanese art contains a lot of dark humor that combines references and jokes to the idea of life and death. I found this interesting and it is also linked to impermanence.  Morimura used satire to poke fun at the way we view art. I look forward to visiting the Japan Society again someday.