TOKYO, JAPAN.- The Mori Art Museum will present The Smile in Japanese Art: From the Jomon Period to the Early Twentieth Century, on view January 27 to May 6, 2007. To kick off 2007 the Mori Art Museum is proud to present two exhibitions exploring laughter. “The Smile in Japanese Art: From the Jomon Period to the Early Twentieth Century,” examines the many faces of the smile in Japanese art from the prehistoric Jomon Period until the Taisho Period (1912-1926). “All About Laughter: Humor in Contemporary Art,” looks at the multifaceted role of humor in contemporary art throughout the world. Start 2007 with a double dose of laughter at the Mori Art Museum!

“The Smile in Japanese Art” starts with a happily smiling clay figurine, called a dogu, made several thousand years ago. Being so old, it is impossible to say whether this figurine is actually laughing or crying, but, by the Kofun period (300-600AD), clay tomb guardians called haniwa appeared, their broad smiles leaving little doubt as to whether they were intended to be laughing – no doubt to ward off unfriendly spirits.

In the Japanese Middle Ages, the rise of Zen Buddhism led to a reverence for paradoxical questions or riddles based on humorous themes and these became an enduring part of Japanese art. The many pictures of Kanzan and Jittoku are classical examples of this genre and, from the Middle Ages to modern times, hanging and hand scrolls in great numbers were produced. Many of these, while more or less keeping to Buddhist conventions, had the effect of making observers burst out laughing. For this exhibition, some of these stories are presented both in the original and through digital media, providing a rare opportunity to examine the whole work in detail.

Paintings by Ito Jakuchu, Maruyama Okyo, Nagasawa Rosetsu, Soga Shohaku, and other popular 18th Century Kyoto artists are included in the exhibition for the ways in which they use animals as a vehicle for laughter. Also exhibited are paintings and sculptures by Hakuin, Enku, and Mokujiki, who dedicated their lives to creating works that would help further the spread of Buddhism amongst the common people of Edo. For them, laughter was not an end in itself, but rather a means through which to achieve this objective.