Past Exhibitions
- Tales of Tragic Love
- July 18, 2018 - August 5, 2018
Throughout the ages, tales of romance have captivated people from every culture. The emotional impact of such stories can become even stronger if the lovers are doomed to tragic ends. This exhibition features ill-fated love stories of medieval Japan from a genre known as otogi zōshi (literally, "companion tales"). These prose narrative stories are executed in the format of illustrated handscrolls (emaki), which are read right to left, with alternating sections of text and image.
These works differ stylistically from handscrolls by high-end professional artists of the Tosa and Kano schools, but their fateful accounts were enjoyed by people from all classes of Japanese society. Through words and pictures, they help us better understand the psyches and sentiments of the medieval Japanese.
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