Public Programs
in 2025
Explore contemporary art through Tokyo Gendai’s five public programs. Participation is free for all visitors.
Art Talks
Tsubomi 'Flower Bud'
Ne 'Root'
Sato 'Meadow'
Hana Artist Award

Art Talks

Art Talks brings together artists, curators, and collectors, as well as leading professionals from a variety of fields. Through exposure to multiple perspectives, participants deepen their understanding of the global art world and explore important themes of contemporary society.

Art Talks will be conducted primarily in Japanese. Remarks by English-speaking participants will be translated into Japanese, while remarks by Japanese participants will not be translated into English. We appreciate your understanding.

This year’s Art Talks is supported by COZUCHI, Tokyo Gendai’s Official Talks Partner.

Friday 12 September
Session 1: 12 PM - 1 PM

A Dialogue Between Photography and Contemporary Art

Session 2: 2 PM - 3 PM

A Dialogue Between Art and Nature

Session 3: 4 PM - 5 PM

Ten Works of Japanese Art, Interpreted by Hiroshi Senju and Taku Satoh

Saturday 13 September
Session 4: 12 PM - 1 PM​

The Future of Asian Art

Session 5: 2 PM - 3 PM

Tsubomi – Polyrhythm

Session 6: 4 PM - 5 PM

A Dialogue Between Contemporary Art and the Brain

Sunday 14 September
Session 7: 12 PM - 1 PM

A Growing Asia, an Expanding Art Fair

Session 8: 2 PM - 3 PM​

The Development of Postwar Japanese Art Collecting

Tsubomi 'Flower Bud' : Polyrhythm

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“Polyrhythm” is a musical term that refers to the simultaneous playing of different rhythms by separate voices or instruments. The artists featured in this year’s Tsubomi ‘Flower Bud’ work within the realm of contemporary art, yet their chosen materials and techniques resonate with the language and context of traditional craft.

Chie Aoki uses lacquer, Namika Nakai works with ceramics, and Ritsue Mishima utilises glass – each material deeply intertwined with the conceptual core of their practices. Like these artists, many others working in contemporary art either incorporate craft traditions into their work or have trained within craft institutions.

This exhibition highlights the generative potential of contemporary art when it embraces elements that may be seen as “craft-like.” Just as individuals today often embody multiple identities—shaped by ethnicity, religion, political beliefs, and social standing—artistic identity, too, is rarely singular.

Craft and contemporary art may beat to entirely different rhythms. Yet it is precisely in their coexistence, in the simultaneous resonance of distinct creative impulses, that we can begin to hear a deeper, more complex harmony. This exhibition invites viewers to listen for the rich harmonies that can only emerge when those distinct rhythms play together.

Ne 'Root'

Ne ‘Root’ presents 4 leading foundations, who will host special showcases of their work at Tokyo Gendai.

We will introduce the activities of Benesse Art Site Naoshima and the Naoshima New Museum of Art which opened in May of this year.

The Obayashi Foundation will display an overview of its support towards artists, thinkers and researchers with a focus on urban development and the building of healthy cities.

The landscape and activities of Enoura Observatory, the main base for Odawara Art Foundation, are presented through panels, scale models, and other visual materials.

CADAN: Contemporary Art Dealers Association Nippon will present My Pick, an exhibition where art collectors introduce their favorite artists and share the pleasures of collecting. The presentation will also feature CADAN’s activities through videos and panels.

Sato 'Meadow'

Our installation program, Sato ‘Meadow’, will introduce 12 installations throughout the venue.

Access the page below for more details.

Discover the 12 installations

Hana Artist Award

The Hana Artist Award was given to Etsuko Nakatsuji (Yoshiaki Inoue Gallery), an artist participating in the Hana ‘Flower’ sector of the fair. New for 2025, the award consists of a cash prize of 10,000 USD and special recognition at the fair.

The jury consists of Mark Rappolt, Editor-in-Chief of ArtReview, Miwako Tezuka, Director of Dib Bangkok, and Kenjiro Hosaka, Director of the Shiga Museum of Art. The winning artist was presented on 11 September during Vernissage.

The Hana Artist Award is supported by ArtSticker, Tokyo Gendai’s Official Supporting Partner.

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Aya Fujioka
 Photographer

(b. 1972, Hiroshima, Japan) studied photography at the College of Art, Nihon University. After furthering her studies in Taiwan and traveling through Europe and Brazil, she developed a distinctive style that blends personal chronicle, street photography, and documentary.
From 2007 to 2013, Fujioka lived in New York with support from the Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan. During that time, she worked as a teaching assistant at the International Center of Photography (ICP). Upon returning to Japan, she began photographing her hometown of Hiroshima, culminating in the photo book Here Goes River (Akaaka, 2017), which documents the city more than 70 years after the war. The book received widespread acclaim and earned multiple major awards, including the Kimura Ihei Award, one of Japan’s most prestigious photography honors.
Her work has been widely exhibited, including at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art in Kanazawa and the Irie Taikichi Memorial Museum of Photography in Nara. Her publications include Comment te dire adieu (Ricochet) and I Don’t Sleep Public (Akaaka). Her forthcoming book LIFE STUDIES, featuring work created during her time in New York, will be published by Akaaka in fall 2025.
Fujioka’s work is held in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. She currently lives and works in Kyoto, Japan.

Pauline Vemare
Phillip and Edith Leonian Curator of Photography, Brooklyn Museum

Pauline Vermare is the Curator of Photography at the Brooklyn Museum, New York. She formerly worked at Magnum, ICP, MoMA, and the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson. She is a co-editor of I’m So Happy You Are Here – Japanese Women Photographers from the 1950s to Now (Aperture, 2024).

Mitsuda Yuri
Professor, Tama Art University

兵庫県生まれ、京都大学文学部卒業後、渋谷区立松濤美術館などで学芸員を務め、2021年から現職、翌年から多摩美術大学アートアーカイヴセンター所長。企画展に「鏡と穴　写真と彫刻の界面」（2017）他多数。著書に『高松次郎　言葉ともの』（2011）『写真、芸術との界面に』（2006）ほか、共著に『History of Japanese Art After 1945:Institutios, Discourses, and Practices』（2023）、『For a New World to Come: Experiments in Japanese Art and Photography, 1968‐1979』（2015）ほか

Marcin Rusak
Artist and Designer　

Born in Warsaw, Poland in 1987, Marcin Rusak is currently based between London and Warsaw. His work sits at the intersection of value, ephemerality, and aesthetics. Rusak explores how contemporary consumption patterns and industry manipulate desire, and how individuals function within these complex systems. His practice, rooted in a search for authenticity, continuously questions, references history, and envisions alternative futures. Harnessing the expressive potential of materials, form, and volume, he fluidly moves between decorative objects and sculpture, from three-dimensional forms to two-dimensional surfaces—allowing his concepts to guide his medium. Rusak holds a BA in European Studies from the University of Warsaw, studied in the Man and Living program at the Design Academy Eindhoven (Netherlands), and earned an MA in Design Products from the Royal College of Art in London. In 2017, he was named a finalist in the U-50 International Hokuriku Craft Award in Toyama, Japan.

Photo: Yasutomo Ebisu

Jun Ishida
GQ Japan Head of Editorial Content

Born in Tokyo. After working as editor-in-chief of Ryuko Tsushin Magazine and an executive fashion feature editor of VOGUE NIPPON and VOGUE HOMME JAPAN, she established her own company in 2010, working as a contributing editor for Casa BRUTUS and T Japan; The New York Times Style magazine. Throughout her career, she has managed to position herself in a unique spot, joining fashion with other fields of the arts. Her editorial work includes sacai A to Z, a comprehensive overview of the fashion brand sacai’s activities, published by Rizzoli (USA).

撮影：十文字美信

HIROSHI SENJU 
Artist

Artist. Born in 1958.  Graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts and completed its graduate program.  Received the Honorable Mention at the Venice Biennale in 1995, as well as the Isamu Noguchi Award, the Imperial Prize, and the Japan Art Academy Prize.  His works are part of the permanent collections of institutions such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Victoria & Albert Museum, and also housed at Kogobuji Temple, Koyasan.  In 2022, he became a member of the Japan Art Academy.  A professor of Kyoto University of the Arts and an advisor at Ritsumeikan University.

Taku Satoh
Graphic designer

Graduated from the Department of Design at Tokyo University of the Arts. President of TSDO Inc. He has designed packaging for products such as “LOTTE XYLITOL Gum” and “Meiji Oishii gyunyu,” as well as symbol marks for museums and corporate logos. He provides art direction on the educational channel of NHK Television, “Design Ah!” “Design Ah! Neo”, He is also the director of 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT and the president of Kyoto University of the Arts.

KURAMORI Kyoko
Senior Producer, NHK Educational Corporation

Responsible for producing television programs on art and design as well as developing related events at NHK, primarily for the program Sunday Art Museum. Notable productions include the NHK Special Katsura Imperial Villa, the 4K program Issey Miyake: The Comfort of Design, and 8K programs such as The Louvre Museum, The Musée d’Orsay, and Welcome to National Treasures. Other series include Techne: Visual Classroom, Bijutune!, Yamato Niso Temple: A Vegetarian Monastery Diary, TAROMAN: Taro Okamoto-Style Tokusatsu Drama, and Design Museum Japan. Representative Director of the Design-DESIGN MUSEUM, a general incorporated association.

Miwako Tezuka, Ph D
Director, Dib Bangkok

Dr. Miwako Tezuka is the inaugural Director of Dib Bangkok, an international contemporary art museum set to open in late 2025. Before this appointment, she held key leadership roles at several prominent institutions in New York, including Gallery Director of the Japan Society, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art at the Asia Society Museum, and Associate Director of Arakawa and Madeline Gins’s Reversible Destiny Foundation.

Dr. Tezuka has curated numerous exhibitions, working with renowned artists such as Chen Chieh-jen, Robert Indiana, Kimsooja, Maya Lin, Mariko Mori, Yoshitomo Nara, Pinaree Sanpitak, and Yang Fudong, among others. She served as Associate Curator of the Hawaiʻi Triennial 2022, which featured works by 46 artists and collectives from across Asia and the Pacific region.


Her scholarly writings have been published in exhibition catalogs and books by institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC; the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; and the Setagaya Museum of Art, Tokyo, among others.

Akiko Miki
Director, Naoshima New Museum of Art/International Artistic Director, Benesse Art Site Naoshima

Akiko Miki was chief and senior curator of Palais de Tokyo (Paris) from 2000 to 2014, and served as artistic director of the Yokohama Triennale in 2011 and co-director in 2017. Her extensive curatorial experience includes such major international exhibitions as the Taipei Biennial (1998) and the Bangkok Art Biennale (2024) as well as museum exhibitions at Barbican Art Gallery (London), Taipei Fine Arts Museum, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (Korea), Mori Art Museum, Yokohama Museum of Art, and Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art.

Photo by Davi Russo

Masako Shiba
Co-founder & Executive Director, Brooklyn Experimental Arts Foundation (BEAF)


New York-based curator and Co-founder of BEAF. Her practice explores art and technology, including space, while BEAF fosters cultural exchange through residencies, exhibitions, and research support.

Photo: Hiraku Ikeda Courtesy of Sokyo Gallery

Chie AOKI
Associate Professor, Department of Craft, Kanazawa College of Art

Born in Gifu Prefecture, Japan in 1981. Completed her doctorate at Kanazawa College of Art. Aoki creates lacquer works that combine life-size bodies with abstracted shapes. Major exhibitions include Roppongi Crossing 2022: Coming & Going, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan (2022); Melting Bodies, Sokyo Gallery, Kyoto, Japan (2021). Her works are in numerous collections, including the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK.

Photo courtesy: Masami Ono, Public Record

Namika Nakai
Artist

Born in Hokkaido in Japan, in 1993. Currently lives and works in Ibaraki. Major solo exhibitions include “Evidence of Time, Record of Action” (Public Record, Auckland) in 2025, “Diving into sea” (THE BRIDGE – Le Ponde Ciel, Osaka), “Float” (TARO NASU, Tokyo), “MELTING TIME” (hakushi, Tokyo) in 2023 and others.

Mari HASHIMOTO
Tsubomi ‘Flower Bud’ Advisor, Cultural Manager / Curatorial Producer

Director of the Preparatory Office for Kankitsuzan Museum of the Enoura Observatory　Visiting professor at Kanazawa Institute of Technology.　Japanese Culture Supervisor and Advisor for the game, “Token Ranbu”. Hashimoto has contributed to various newspapers and magazines as a writer throughout her career but she has also been involved with various activities from appearances on art and history broadcasting programmes to curation and consulting for arts and cultural institutions.

Mika Ninagawa
Photographer, Film Director, Artist

Although primarily a photographer, Mika Ninagawa is a multidisciplinary artist who also works extensively in film, video and spatial installations. She is also a member of the creative team EiM.
She is the recipient of numerous photography awards, including the prestigious Kimura Ihei Award. A book of her photographs was published by Rizzoli New York in 2010.
She has directed five feature films, including Helter-Skelter (2012) and Diner (2019), and the Netflix original drama FOLLOWERS (2020).
She has published more than 120 books of photographs, held or participated in over 150 solo exhibitions and 130 group exhibitions, and continues to present her work enthusiastically in Japan and abroad.
Her solo exhibition Mika Ninagawa: Eternity in a Moment (TOKYO NODE, Dec. 2023–Feb. 2024) attracted over 250,000 visitors.
From 11 January 2025 to 30 March 2025, the exhibition NINAGAWA Mika with EiM：Lights of the beyond, Shadows of this world was held at the Kyoto City Kyocera Museum of Art.
The three volumes of her latest photo collection series, Eternity in a Moment, were published in October 2024, from Akio Nagasawa Publishing & Case Publishing.
https://mikaninagawa.com



Selected exhibitions
Group exhibition ‘I’M SO HAPPY YOU ARE HERE’, Palais de l’Archevêché, 2024.
Group exhibition ‘Tokyo: Art & Photography’, Musée d’Ashemolean, 2021-2022.
MIKA NINAGAWA INTO FICTION / REALITY, Beijing Times Museum, 2022.
‘MIKA NINAGAWA’, Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei (MOCA Taipei), 2016.


Nobuko NAKANO
Neuroscientist / Doctor of Medical Science / Cognitive Scientist
Professor, Higashi Nippon International University / Affiliate Professor, Kyoto University of the Arts

Biography
1998 B.A. in Department of Applied Chemistry, Faculty of Engineering, The University of Tokyo
2008 PhD in Department of Neuroscience, Graduate school of Medicine, The University of Tokyo
2008 Post-doc researcher, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
2010 Returned to Japan. Mainly engaged in research and writing.
2015 Professor at Higashi Nippon International University
2020 Affiliate Professor at Kyoto University of the Arts

Currently, she is actively engaged in research and writing on the themes of the brain and psychology. She is known for her narrative approach to deciphering the phenomena and
characters that occur in human society from a scientific perspective.

Kyoko Hattori
Pace Gallery Vice President

Kyoko Hattori is Vice President at Pace Gallery and the Director of its Tokyo location. Based in Japan, she leads the gallery’s strategic development in the region. Prior to joining Pace, she played a key role in launching the Tokyo office of the international  auction house Phillips, where she served as Japan representative and oversaw major sales, including works by Jean-Michel Basquiat. With an extensive network of artists, collectors, and institutions both in Japan and abroad, Kyoko is committed to elevating  the visibility of contemporary Japanese art on a global scale. Her background in both art and business allows her to bring a thoughtful, multidimensional perspective to her leadership.

Seokho Jeong

Director, Art Busan

Seokho Jeong, having joined Art Busan in 2019 after his studies in the US and Germany is responsible for the two fairs – Art Busan and Define Seoul. Art Busan, first launched in 2012 with the aim to invigorate the art scene in Busan has now become Korea’s leading fair, bringing global art professionals to the coastal city. The company has developed its mission to interact with a spectrum of galleries and institutions within and outside of Korea. Seokho has been devoted to introducing international gallery programs in Korea, connecting overseas galleries to local collectors via Art Busan which led a number of galleries to expand their branch in Korea. Following the momentum in 2023, he launched a new fair brand, Define Seoul, combining collectible design and contemporary art in the capital’s most vibrant district, Seongsu-dong to further diversify the fair business.

SHUYING YANG
Fair Director, ART SG

Having worked across auctions, galleries, and art fairs, Shuyin Yang has extensive art world experience, much of which has been spent in Southeast Asia. She started her career in art at Christie’s, working in London, Singapore, and Hong Kong. She then joined a contemporary art gallery as the director of their Singapore space, helping to develop their gallery programme and art fair strategy. Shuyin was appointed Fair Director of Art Central Hong Kong in 2017, and she has been serving as the Fair Director of ART SG since 2019. She continues to lead the fair’s development and is responsible for its ongoing growth, following the successful launch in January 2023. Shuyin brings invaluable knowledge of the Southeast Asian art scene, with deep ties and networks spanning artists, galleries, collectors, curators, and key industry players.

Eri Takane 
Fair Director, Tokyo Gendai

In addition to working as an art consultant for artists and collectors in both Japan and the United States, she has held diverse roles in the Japanese art scene, including Japan Lead for Google Arts & Culture, Art Director at SEZON ART GALLERY, and host of the Tokyo FM radio program Sustaina Days. She lived in New York for approximately 13 years, during which she worked at The Japan Foundation, contributing to cultural exchange between Japan and the U.S. through support for American nonprofit art organizations. She holds a Master’s degree in Visual Arts Administration from New York University.

Vivian Li
The Lupe Murchison Curator of Contemporary Art, Dallas Museum of Art

Dr. Vivian Li is the Lupe Murchison Curator of Contemporary Art at the Dallas Museum of Art. Li has realized ambitious collaborations with artists such as Tiffany Chung, Mel Chin, and Guadalupe Rosales, and organized Slip Zone: A New Look at Postwar Abstraction in the Americas and East Asia (co-curated) and the retrospective Matthew Wong: The Realm of Appearances. Prior to coming to the DMA, she worked at the Guggenheim Museum; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the Worcester Art Museum and was a lecturer at Clark University. A specialist in postwar and contemporary art in Asia, Li received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She has edited and contributed to various publications, including the Oxford Art Journal, Art History, Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, and the recent anthology Postwar Revisited—A Global Art History. 

Midori Nishizawa
Independent curator / Advisor

Midori Nishizawa is an independent curator and art advisor specializing in postwar Japanese art. From 2004 to 2018, she has initiated curatorial projects featuring the work of over fifty Japanese artists, including Atsuko Tanaka, Tsuruko Yamazaki and Takesada Matsutani at various international venues in the marketplace. Other initiatives include The Masked Portrait I & II; a semi-survey of postwar Japanese art exhibited at the Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York in 2008 and 2011. In 2012, she presented an exhibition called A Visual Essay on Gutai at 32 East 69th Street, at Hauser & Wirth in New York. This exhibition was a tribute to the Gutai, revisiting and updating the 1958 Gutai debut exhibition in the US at the same address. Before becoming independent in 1996, she was the director of the Akira Ikeda Gallery in Tokyo (1986 -1992) and New York (1992-1994). Since 2001, she lives and works in Nagoya.

Kamiya Yukie 
Head, Curatorial Division, Chief Curator, The National Art Center, Tokyo

Kamiya Yukie is currently Chief Curator of the National Art Center, Tokyo. Kamiya previously served as Gallery Director of Japan Society, New York, Chief Curator of Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, and Associate Curator of New Museum, New York. She was a co-curator of the 12th Shanghai Biennial (2018-19). Kamiya has organized exhibitions bridging Asia and other regions on cross-temporal themes with an interdisciplinary approach, and curated/co-curated monographic exhibitions of various artists including Yasumasa Morimura, Yoko Ono, Tsuyoshi Ozawa, Simon Starling, as well as group exhibitions such as “Radicalism in the Wilderness: Japanese Artists in the Global 1960s” (2019), “Discordant Harmony: Critical Reflection on the Imagination of Asia” (2015-18), and “Re:Quest Japanese Contemporary Art since the 1970s” (2013). She was honored with the Academic Prize from the Western Art Foundation, Japan (20110. Kamiya is a member of International Association of Art Critics (AICA)and an advisory board of Shigeko Kubota Video Art Foundation. Her writings have appeared in publications extensively and co-authored including Hiroshi Sugimoto: Gates of Paradise (Skira Rizzoli, 2017), Ravaged: Art and Culture in Times of Conflict (Mercatorfonds, 2014), California-Pacific Triennial (Orange County Museum, 2013) and Creamier: Contemporary Art and Culture, (Phaidon, 2011).