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Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Mar 8, 2007

The Germans come to play

In most all of the world's larger cities, traditionally the grandest buildings have been religious in orientation. As places of congregation, they were necessarily characterized by large open spaces. As conduits to the spiritual, their design included surging spires, pagodas or minarets. The current...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 1, 2007

Storm clouds over an artist's life cut short

In the summer of 1924, fresh out of art school in Japan and settling into the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere in Paris, Yuzo Saeki (1898-1928) was taken by his classmate Katsuzo Satomi to have his work critiqued by the Fauvist painter, anarchist and journalist Maurice de Vlaminck. Just when he was getting...
CULTURE / Books
Feb 25, 2007

Upstairs, downstairs and inside old Japan

Companions of the Holiday by Donald Richie, with an introduction by Timothy Harris and an afterword by the author. Tokyo/New York: Printed Matter Press, 181 pp., $15 (paper) Donald Richie is known to readers of The Japan Times for his regular reviews of books dealing with Asia, and more particularly...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Feb 22, 2007

Breaking into an insider's tea-drinking club

The term "gaijin artist" can be something of an insult to those who make Japan their home. It is, after all, parochial and old-fashioned to differentiate artists strictly on the basis of what passport they carry.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 25, 2007

Dairakudakan dancers play with Josef Nadj

Speaking in Tokyo a year ago, Josef Nadj, one of the most respected choreographers in the contemporary dance world, said that for his next project in Japan he wanted to create something playful for the audiences in collaboration with Japanese dancers and Japanese culture. The 49-year-old Yugoslav-born...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 19, 2007

'The Departed'

When the Hong Kong thriller "Infernal Affairs" came out in 2002, it was apparent at a glance that the filmmakers had a thing for Michael Mann, and his film "Heat" in particular. All sleek, cool, blue-tinged urban noir imagery and equally cold, controlled performances, "Infernal Affairs" was a tight exercise...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2006

Mansfield Center eyes lay judge debut

A new system that gives ordinary citizens in Japan a role in deciding the outcome of criminal trials debuts in less than three years.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Dec 28, 2006

Only representations of the real thing

Something recurring -- a style, a mood or a tendency that threads its way through the previous 12 months and, in doing so, traces a theme -- that's what I look for when it comes once again to appraising another year-in-art. This time round the resonating word is "representation."
BUSINESS
Dec 21, 2006

Tax yield lifts '07 budget

The Finance Ministry on Wednesday handed the Cabinet the fiscal 2007 draft budget, which, due to projected increased tax revenues, reflects the first spending rise in two years but also slashes the issuance of new government bonds.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 21, 2006

New show offers breakthrough installation

About a month ago at Tokyo's Shugoarts, photographer Yasumasa Morimura gave a performance in which he coopted the speech author Yukio Mishima gave from the balcony of the Self-Defense Force headquarters in Tokyo in 1970 before committing ritual seppuku inside the building. In his performance, Morimura...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 21, 2006

Abe banks on continued growth

The government will cut new bond sales by the largest margin on record, curb spending across the board and take a sharp bite out of the deficit under the fiscal 2007 draft budget submitted Wednesday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 7, 2006

"Toru Seno: From Cradle to Grave"

Maru GalleryCloses in 24 days
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Dec 1, 2006

Journey into the mind of a musical genius

Agnieszka Holland has long been known for translating classical/historical material into pop-culture matter (in "Total Eclipse," for instance, she cast Leonardo di Caprio as a punkish Arthur Rimbaud) and her latest, "Copying Beethoven," is a fictional biopic of the famed composer during the last years...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Nov 30, 2006

A RETURN TO THE REAL

The dominant image of contemporary architecture in Japan is one of serene simplicity: spaces that are light, bright and weightless, in which structure and materiality are reduced to the minimum.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Nov 11, 2006

Mary Ishin Sung Katayama

Educated in Japan and the U.S., and each year making frequent official trips to Europe, Mary Ishin Sung Katayama says that she thinks of herself as borderless. "I love to travel and feel a need to be on the go every month or two," she said.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 10, 2006

'Sovereignty has to be taken'

Cillian Murphy certainly has romantic-lead looks, but his filmography reveals an actor more committed to a diverse career. Many viewers will recall his portrayal of the twisted Scarecrow character in "Batman Begins," but he also played a determined survivor in Danny Boyle's "28 Days Later" and a transvestite...

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?