March of the phantoms - demons and spirits in Japanese art
An exhibition at ArtisTree parades the Japanese fascination with the supernatural. Catherine Shaw tells a ghost story
Ghosts, demons and spirits have long been part of Japanese folklore, passed down from generation to generation through stories and legends, picture scrolls and the performing arts. The way Japanese culture has given a visual form to this realm of the supernatural is the theme of a new exhibition, "Parade: Invisibles in Japanese Media Arts - From Night Parade of One Hundred Demons to IS Parade", at ArtisTree in Taikoo Place.
Deeply held beliefs in the spirit or "invisible world" are still reflected in day-to-day life in Japan, from its many festivals and rituals to modern art, according to the exhibition's Tokyo-based curator, Mami Kataoka. "We wanted to explore how this has influenced artists, especially in the context of new modern media," she says. "The origins of manga, anime and character culture that enjoy tremendous popularity in contemporary Japan can also be seen within the context of this Japanese view of nature."
The exhibition offers an enticing glimpse of works from award-winning artists selected in large part from the prestigious annual Japan Media Arts Festival, renowned for recognising outstanding works from a diverse range of media from animation to games.
Kataoka - the chief curator of Tokyo's Mori Art Museum, which was appointed by Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs to curate and manage the Hong Kong event - has paired 28 signature artworks with several public programmes. They include 17 film screenings, a symposium with guests such as Japanese yokai (supernatural monster) researcher Koichi Yumoto who will be showing works from his unique collection.
To set the scene, Kataoka turned to a 16th-century scroll, the Illustrated Night Parade of a Hundred Demons (attributed to Tosa Mitsunobu) featuring a procession of colourful demons and creatures marching from right to left (it was believed that demons march at dusk, disappearing at dawn).
In addition to illustrating the malevolent and playful nature of demons, the scroll also shows natural or man-made objects such as furniture and clothing with special powers (items that have existed for a long time are believed to take on a spiritual dimension), and illustrating that animals such as the fox, badger or snake have the power to change into spirits or demons.