LOS ANGELES, CA.- BLUM announced curator Mika Yoshitake’s position as Senior Curatorial Director. Yoshitake joins the BLUM team after many years of collaboration including one-person exhibitions on Takashi Murakami (Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2007), Lee Ufan (Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, 2010, and Guggenheim, 2011), Yukinori Yanagi (Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, 2021), Yoshitomo Nara (Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2021–22), and major survey shows at the gallery such as the AICA-USA award-winning Requiem for the Sun: The Art of Mono-ha (2012), and Parergon: Japanese Art of the 1980s and 1990s (2019), and more.

As a scholar with expertise in postwar Japanese art, this leadership role will see Yoshitake steering a new chapter in the gallery’s longtime relationship with and commitment to Japan and its nuanced art histories. Yoshitake will work closely with the gallery as it nurtures new partnerships with artists and estates, such as the recently announced representation of Gutai pioneer Sadamasa Motonaga and celebrated painter and sculptor Etsuko Nakatsuji; a new volume on Yukinori Yanagi, published by BLUM Books, slated for release this spring to coincide with his major survey at the Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan; and additional news forthcoming.

Her first project as Senior Curatorial Director will inaugurate the new BLUM New York location, opening later this year. Entitled Written with a Splash of Blood, the multi-generational and interdisciplinary exhibition will showcase work by key artists from Gutai, Mono-ha, New Wave, and post-Superflat movements through today, traversing the decades from the immediate aftermath of postwar Japan, onward.

Yoshitake states: “Ever since meeting Tim Blum in 2005, I have had the rare opportunity to work together on a number of milestone exhibitions that have been integral to my career and to the reassessment of postwar Japanese art history within a global context. I share BLUM’s unique and holistic vision of contemporary art, and am deeply thrilled to embark on this new chapter.”

Tim Blum states: “I’ve had the pleasure of knowing and working with Mika Yoshitake for nearly twenty years—it’s been one of the great privileges of my professional life. The depth of her knowledge of art, especially that of postwar Japan, is unparalleled. We’ve worked with Mika on groundbreaking curatorial projects throughout the gallery’s history. We’re thrilled to advance this exchange with Mika, now a full-time member of our team, as BLUM’s longstanding commitment to postwar Japan reaches a critical nexus.”

Mika Yoshitake, PhD, has worked in the field for the last two decades pushing forward acclaimed exhibitions and scholarship worldwide such as Breath(e): Towards Climate and Social Justice with Glenn Kaino at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA (2024–25); Yayoi Kusama: 1945 to Now with Doryun Chong at M+ Hong Kong, traveled to Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain, and Serralves Museum, Porto, Portugal (2022–23); Yoshitomo Nara, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, traveled to Yuz Museum Shanghai (2021–22); and KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature, New York Botanical Garden, Bronx, NY (2021). She previously served as Curator at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC (2011–18) where she curated the six-venue North American tour of Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors (2017–19), Shana Lutker: Le “NEW” Monocle (2015–16), Days of Endless Time with Kelly Gordon (2014-15), and coordinated Ai Weiwei: According to What? (2012–13), among other exhibitions. Yoshitake’s scholarship has been published widely as catalogue editor of aforementioned exhibitions, and contributed to numerous catalogues including, Yoshitomo Nara (Guggenheim Bilbao, 2024); Ryoji Ikeda (Hirosaki Museum of Contemporary Art, 2022); Mika Tajima (Inventory Press, 2022); Kishio Suga: Situations (Pirelli HangarBicocca, 2016); Kishio Suga (Vangi Sculpture Garden Museum, 2015); Lee Ufan Versailles (Palace of Versailles, 2014); Carl Andre: Sculpture as Place (Dia Art Foundation, 2014); Tokyo 1955-1970: A New Avant-garde (MoMA, 2012); Lee Ufan: Marking Infinity (Guggenheim, 2011); Target Practice: Painting Under Attack, 1949-78 (Seattle Art Museum, 2009); and © MURAKAMI (MOCA, 2007). Her writing has been published in Artforum, Art in America, Bijutsu Techō, and Exposure, among other journals.