This Golden Week in Kyoto will be packed with fashion and art exhibitions, showcasing temples, shrines, Japanese gardens, and historical buildings that are usually closed to the public. The 11th annual KYOTOGRAPHIE Kyoto International Photography Festival, held around this time every year, is once again sponsored by international luxury brands such as Chanel Nexus Hall, Kering, the Loewe Foundation, and champagne house Ruinart. Works by world-renowned photographers are on display at various locations throughout Kyoto City. Also starting this year, a new sister event, the music festival KYOTOPHONIE, sponsored by Bottega Veneta, will feature live performances by international artists during Golden Week.

In Kyoto, there has been a growing movement to preserve traditional townhouses and old houses as galleries, and the preservation of traditional craft techniques and artisan culture is being reconsidered. The special exhibition "Leaping Creators: Art, Design, and Technology Looking to the Future of Humanity and Nature" at the Kyoto City Kyocera Museum of Art's new Higashiyama Cube brings together works by 20 artists active both in Japan and overseas across genres. We'll also be introducing some of the exhibitions you'll want to see in Kyoto during Golden Week, including the first anniversary celebration of Shijohan, a multi-layered space of expression that opened a year ago in an alley south of Nishinotoin Takatsuji.


Yachikuan (Former Kawasaki Family Residence)

A Complete Guide to KYOTOGRAPHIE 2023: Enjoy the 15 Venues to the Fullest

Kazuhiko Matsumura "Threads of the Heart" (@Yachikuan)

Kazuhiko Matsumura Matsumura "Heartstrings"

KYOTOGRAPHIE, the Kyoto International Photography Festival, which opened on April 15th, is exhibiting works under the theme of "BORDER" at 15 venues across Kyoto City. One of the attractions of this year's festival is the use of buildings that are normally closed to the public. The first place you'll want to visit is the Yatakean (Former Kawasaki Residence), which serves as a satellite space and also houses a shop selling merchandise and photo books related to the event. Built in the Taisho era, this Kyoto City-designated tangible cultural property was used by Gucci for its experiential exhibition, "GUCCI BAMBOO HOUSE," in the summer of 2021. The Frank Lloyd Wright-style Western-style townhouse, a blend of Japanese and Western styles, also remains.


Yachikuan Kazuhiko Matsumura "Heartstrings"

The Western-style building part of Yachikuan

This time, we are exhibiting "Heartstrings" by Kazuhiko Matsumura, winner of the grand prize at "KG+SELECT2022," a satellite event co-hosted by KYOTOGRAPHIE with the aim of incubating young photographers. The meticulous photographs, typical of the photographer, who works at a newspaper company and has interviewed and photographed four groups of dementia patients over a long period of time, are connected by a thread.


A pop-up space for France's NO FORMAT, a guest label at Yatakean KYOTOPHONIE

The same space also features a pop-up space for France's NO FORMAT, the first guest label invited by KYOTOPHONIE, a borderless music festival that has been held alongside the festival as a sister event since this year, with records, CDs, album jacket designs and more on display.


Salif Keita's live performance at KYOTOPHONIE held at Tofukuji Temple's Komyoin Temple

Takagi Yuriko "PARALLEL WORLD" (@Nijo Castle's Ninomaru Palace Kitchen)

Takagi Yuriko "PARALLEL "This place is truly beautiful first thing in the morning," says photographer Yuriko Takagi herself. At the venue for "PARALLEL WORLD," "Nijo Castle, Ninomaru Palace Kitchen, Okiyodokoro," Takagi exhibits two parallel series: photographs of people in traditional attire taken during her travels to 12 countries, and fashion shoots from the 1980s. The venue, designed by architect Tsuyoshi Tane, features a stunning array of colored prints and prints on photographic paper, washi paper, cotton paper, and plaster, even extending into the outdoor garden. Archived fashion photographs from the 1980s taken for advertisements and magazines, including those of Jean Paul Gaultier, John Galliano, Issey Miyake, Comme des Garçons, Paul Smith, and Jurgen Lehl, are complemented by newly shot original prints and oversized digital prints of Dior's new collection.

His energetic creative activities are astounding, including his sub-zero crystal series "chaoscosmos vol.1 -icing process-," which was unveiled at GYRE in Omotesando last December, and new photos taken at the "Christian Dior, Couturier of Dreams" exhibition (until May 28th) at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, for which tickets have already sold out online.

Yuriko Takagi's "PARALLEL WORLD" is being held at the Okiyodoko Kitchen of the Ninomaru Palace in Nijo Castle / Photo by Kenryou Gu


Kondaya Genbei Exterior


``Mother’s #38” Courtesy of The Third Gallery Aya © Ishiuchi Miyako

From the series of "Sasurai" © Yuhki Touyama



"Existence #11 from the series of Nature JINEN" © Yu Yamauchi

"In Kurokura," a black plaster octagonal dome located at the back of the same premises, Yamauchi Yu's work "Nature (Jinen)" was photographed during nine years of visiting Yakushima, spending nearly a month in the forest each time, confronting and photographing Mother Nature using only natural light and his own headlamp. The work is exhibited with an awareness of the spatiality of the building.

Ishinai Miyako x Toyama Yuki "Looking Through the Window" on display at Kondaya Genbei Takein Room / Photo by Takeshi Asano

Yu Yamauchi "Nature (JINEN)" on display at Kondaya Genbei Kurokura / Photo by Takeshi Asano

"Happy Pills" by Paolo Woods / ArnaudRobert
Exhibition view of "Happy Pills" at Kurochiku Manzo Building

"Happy Pills," a pop-inspired installation by Swiss journalist, film director, and author Arnaud Robert and Florence-based documentary cameraman Paolo Woods, is taking place at the Kurochiku Manzo Building in Hokomachi, the district where the Gion Festival is held. The installation showcases various stories related to "drugs" that were told over a five-year period, spanning a globetrotting journey. The floor-to-ceiling photographs question the contemporary boundaries of "happiness," including an Indian bodybuilder overdosing on steroids, a Haitian street vendor selling counterfeit Viagra and expired pills imported from the Dominican Republic, a century of pharmaceutical company advertising, and social media and the sense of happiness.



List of portraits of the 118 passengers rescued from the rubber boat, Mediterranean Sea, August 1, 2016. © César Dezfuli

Cesar Dezfuri, a Madrid-born journalist and photographer of Iranian and Spanish descent, is exhibiting his work "Passengers," a 2016 documentary following the lives of 118 refugees who crossed the Mediterranean Sea from the African coast to Europe and were rescued on the Italian island of Sicily, at the Sfera Building in Gion.


Virgil Abloh's show at Pitti Uomo in Florence, Italy in 2017. Word art was projected onto the exterior wall of the Pitti Palace.

This story of the rescue of African refugees in Italy was also used as the theme of Virgil Abloh's show at the Pitti Palace when he was invited as a guest designer at Pitti Uomo in June 2017, "I'LL NEVER FORGIVE THE OCEAN," which became a hot topic.

Cesar Dezfuri's "Passengers" at Sferaville / Photo by Kenryou Gu



"Yesterday's Sandwich" © Boris Mikhailov, VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Ukrainian artist Boris Mikhailov also presents experimental photographs that tackle similar social and political themes. Last year, a large-scale retrospective was held at the Maison Européen de la Photographie in Paris. This time, he will be presenting his slideshow-style work "Yesterday's Sandwich" with Pink Floyd's 1973 album "The Dark Side of the Moon" playing in the background. The work, which superimposes multiple film negatives stuck together with the duality and contradictions of Soviet society, reflects various ambiguous boundaries. The approximately 10.5-minute video was shown at Fujii Daimaru Black Storage, one block south of Fujii Daimaru on Shijo Street, just north of Ayakoji Teramachi Nishi.

Boris Mikhailov, "Yesterday's Sandwich," at Fujii Daimaru Black Storage / Photo by Takeshi Asano



Boy tricycle © Dennis Morris

Dennis Morris - Count Shelly sound system

Colored Black - Front Room Exhibition at Sekai Souko

Colored Black, which is being held at Sekai Souko, located east of Tominokoji Bukkoji Temple near the venue, is an exhibition of works by Jamaican-British photographer Dennis Morris. He was previously interviewed by Fashion Headline and has a large fan base in Japan for his official photographs and photo books of Bob Marley and the Sex Pistols. This time, he will be exhibiting his new works and the "black house" lifestyle of Caribbean immigrants in East London in the 1960s and 1970s. Along with photographs of British reggae musicians such as Steel Pulse, the exhibition also features a recreation of a front (living) room, featuring interior decor and accessories that recreate the life of a typical British Caribbean immigrant at the time. The venue also doubles as a photo studio, and Dennis himself was seen casually posing for photos with fans during his stay. There is also a sound system on the first floor.

Dennis Morris's "Colored Black" at Sekai Souko / Photo by Takeshi Asano

© Mabel Poblet Studio


Mabel Poblet's "WHERE OCEAN MEET" at the Museum of Kyoto / Photo by Takeshi Asano





Meirin Elementary School, which opened in 1869 and is a registered tangible cultural property of Japan, has retained its prewar architecture and is now home to the Kyoto Art Center, where a variety of programs are held. KYOTOGRAPHIE is hosting the "World Press Photo: Resilience - Stories of Women Inspiring Change" exhibition. This exhibition showcases women and girls from around the world, including a young girl who decided not to cut her hair until she could attend school again during the COVID-19 lockdown, and an elementary school student who trains in swimming and rescue techniques in the Indian Ocean off Tanzania. Seventeen photographers from 13 countries have shared their communities' resilience through their work.

Kyoto Art Center "World Press Photo: Resilience - Stories of Women Inspiring Change" / Photo by Takeshi Asano





Ryosokuin, a sub-temple of Kenninji Temple, is a well-known venue for KYOTOGRAPHIE. While admiring the Momoyama-era dry landscape garden and the strolling pond garden at its back, one of the joys of each exhibition is anticipating which artists' works will be exhibited within the grounds and teahouse. Past exhibits have included works by Nobuyoshi Araki, Ikko Narahara, and Alfred Ehrhardt of the Bauhaus. This time, the exhibition features "Alba'hian (Light of Dawn)" by Ivorian visual artist Joana Choumali, born in 1975. Composed of motifs, drawings, and embroidery on top of multiple layers of printed photographs sewn together, the works are filled with a positive energy that has been created over a long period of time. Her work, "Kyoto-Abidjan," which features photographs of people living in the shopping district and people at the markets in Abidjan, is on display in the arcade of Demachi Masugata Shopping Street, where KYOTOGRAPHIE's permanent space "DELTA," which opened in 2020, is located.

Joana Choumali's "Kyoto-Abidjan" displayed in the arcade of Demachi Masugata Shopping Street / Photo by Takeshi Asano



Coco Kapitan's "Ookini" exhibition at "ASPHODEL"

Coco Kapitan's "Ookini" exhibition at Komyoin Temple

Coco Kapitan, who stayed at the "DELTA" artist residency for two months from October last year and created her works, Capitán is exhibiting at three venues: the Onishi Seiemon Museum near Yachikuan; the gallery ASPHODEL, located in a corner of a Gion teahouse; and the Komyoin Temple, a sub-temple of Tofukuji Temple, overlooking the Japanese garden created by Shigemori Mirei, a representative landscape gardener of the Showa era. Supported by the Loewe Foundation and Hearst Fujingaho, the "Ookini" exhibition features film footage of teenagers, including high school students, maiko, and kyogen performers, whom the artist encountered in Kyoto. Even from a Japanese perspective, the perspectives exploring the roots of traditional Japanese culture, such as a documentary about a young boy who will become a future kettle maker, one of the 10 artisans of the Sen family, which has a 400-year history (Onishi Seiemon Museum) and footage of the Hanazono Zen School (Komyoin Temple, a sub-temple of Tofukuji Temple), are fascinating.

Coco Capitán's "Ookini" at Komyoin, a sub-temple of Tofukuji Temple / Photo by Kenryou Gu




Roger Everhard's "Escapism" Exhibition at Shimadai Gallery

Making-of Escapism, 2022 (various Swiss coffee-cream lids)

Facing Oike Street, Shimadai Gallery is home to a well filled with beautiful water, and is currently hosting a work titled "Escapism" by Swiss photographer Roger Everhard, born in 1984. The Swiss have a leisurely habit of peeling off the caps of coffee creamer bottles printed with photos of world-famous tourist attractions and collecting them. While staying at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, the artist has taken high-resolution close-up photographs of the lids and re-presented them in a pop style.



GAK YAMADA "Life, Cosmic flower"

GAK YAMADA "Life, Cosmic flower" on display at HOSOO GALLERY Kaleidoscope installation for "flower"

Yamada Manabu participated in Champagne Maison Ruinart's art residency program last fall, which is awarded to the winner of the 2022 KYOTOGRAPHIE International Portfolio Review award, and created this work. The exhibit, themed "Life: The Flower of the Universe," featured on-site photographs of grapes, leaves, and stones harvested from Ruinart's vineyards, gold leaf brought from Kyoto, and cellophane, which biodegrades in the soil, along with sound and video recordings made in the underground cellar "Crayel." The HOSOO GYALLERY, which served as the venue, featured brush strokes made with charcoal and plaster mixed into the layered rammed earth and 24-karat gold leaf walls, all of which overlap with the cellar's history.


Inma Barrero "BREAKING WALL" (@ Ito Yu Former Machiya Site)

Inma Barrero, a New York-based artist who creates objects and installations using ceramics and metal, has presented a work titled "BREAKING WALL," which makes use of a vacant lot in Hokomachi, the Gion Festival's main festival grounds. The video installation uses ceramics and their fragments collected with the cooperation of Kyoto potteries and ceramic artists.

Event Overview
11th "KYOTOGRAPHIE Kyoto International Photography Festival"
Dates: Saturday, April 15th, 2023 - Sunday, May 14th, 2023
Fee: A passport ticket of 6,000 yen (3,000 yen for students, tax included) allows admission to almost all exhibitions.
Weekday-only passport: 4,500 yen (available only on weekdays, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays. Check the official website for details)
KYOTOGRAPHIE official website (https://www.kyotographie.jp/)

The momentum of overseas luxury brands is unstoppable. What supports this momentum is not just the ingenuity of the designer shuffle, but also the common thread of the craftsmen who ensure quality. Louis Vuitton, which demonstrates the pride of its atelier as a trunk maker; Dior, which preserves the savoir-faire of a 77-year-old couture house; and Bottega Veneta, which focuses on the craftsmanship of Italian leather artisans—these are the fruits of steady efforts to communicate their brand heritage to the market. Not to mention the "Christian Dior, Couture of Dreams" exhibition currently being held at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, which is said to be the most difficult exhibition to get tickets for, Chanel, Hermès, Louis Vuitton, Saint Laurent, Cartier, and Gucci have held numerous exhibitions in recent years, as well as pop-up events at department stores featuring artisans. One of the reasons Japan has yet to produce a global luxury brand is the issue of passing on artisanal skills. While this issue has recently become a hot topic, an exhibition themed on traditional Japanese crafts and techniques, which the aforementioned international brands have long recognized and utilized in their production processes, is currently being held in Kyoto.


Naho Tamura, WonderGlass, "Float," 2013-15, Collection of WonderGlass

The special exhibition "Leaping Creators: Art, Design, and Technology for the Future of People and Nature," running until June 4th at the Higashiyama Cube New Wing of the Kyoto City Kyocera Museum of Art, brings together works by 20 artists active in Japan and abroad across a range of genres. Curated by design journalist Noriko Kawakami, the exhibition features works themed around the Anthropocene, a vision of the era proposed by Nobel Prize-winning chemist Paul Crutzen. Due to the postponement of the event due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the works have been brushed up, making this a truly worthwhile exhibition, focusing on artists born in the 1970s and 1980s, including new works by Takahiro Iwasaki and TAKT PROJECT.


TAKT PROJECT "glow ⇄ grow: globe" 2023, Collection of the artist
Takahiro Yagi + Motoi Ishibashi & Tomoaki Yanagisawa (Rhizomatiks) + Shinichi Mita "Newton's Lid" 2023, Collection of the artist



A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE "TYPE-Ⅱ 004" and Miyamae Yoshiyuki

"A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE" is the only participant from the field of costume design. "A-POC," which stands for "A Piece of Cloth," began with the creation of a cylindrical piece of cloth that is computer-controlled and molded from a single thread, as exemplified by seamless knitting. It is a conceptual project that makes full use of the cutting-edge technology that is Miyake Issey's core competence. The exhibit this time is the second installment of the "TYPE-II Tatsuo Miyajima project," a project with contemporary artist Tatsuo Miyajima announced in 2021. The previous project featured a blouson with digital numbers woven in jacquard using a technique called "Steam Stretch" and Triporous, a new material made from rice husks developed by the Sony Group. This time, the works feature vividly colored numbers printed on materials bonded together using a bonding process.

"In an age where digital printing is becoming commonplace, I pursued the concept of 'wearing time' through screen printing, a traditional method of hand-dyed textile printing still practiced by Kyoto artisans," explains Yoshiyuki Miyamae, who served as ISSEY MIYAKE's designer from 2011 to 2019 and currently leads the brand's engineering team. Based on Miyajima's opinion that randomly selecting the numbers was important, the numbers were chosen by rolling dice.

"I had been planning this project since before the pandemic, but the inspiration behind it was Issey Miyake, with whom I have worked on exhibitions and other projects. Miyake cherished interactions with people from different fields and embodied the idea of creating the next era by thinking, creating, and showing. I hope that visitors to this exhibition will encounter works born from the visions of each artist and that it will serve as an opportunity for dialogue with people from different fields."

Event Overview
Special Exhibition "Leaping Creators: Art, Design, and Technology for the Future of People and Nature"
Dates: Thursday, March 9th – Sunday, June 4th, 2023 
Opening Hours: 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM (last admission at 5:30 PM)
Closed: Mondays (open on public holidays)
Venue: Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art, Higashiyama Cube, New Building
Admission Fee: Adults: 1,800 (1,600) yen, University and vocational school students: 1,500 (1,300) yen, High school and junior high school students: 1,100 (900) yen, Elementary school students: 600 (400) yen, Preschoolers free
        *Prices in parentheses are for advance tickets and groups of 20 or more.

*This article has been revised and updated with additional photos from the article published in the May 2023 issue of Monthly Shopping Architecture (on sale April 28).




There is a growing trend in Kyoto to renovate townhouses and open them as galleries, and Shijohan, a multi-layered expression space that opened a year ago in an alley south of Nishinotoin Takatsuji, is holding a Special Exhibition to Commemorate the 800th Anniversary of Unkei's Death from April 23rd to May 7th to mark its first anniversary.


"Special Exhibition Commemorating the 800th Anniversary of Unkei's Death" (@Shijohan)

There are 18 Buddhist statues recognized nationwide as those of Unkei, a genius sculptor of Buddhist statues who was active from the late Heian period to the early Kamakura period. Five of these statues are enshrined at Joraku-ji Temple in Ashina, Yokosuka, where they are officially licensed. Two contemporary artists, active internationally, primarily in advertising, have created these works of art. Photographed by Munetaka Tokuyama, a photographer known for his work on ads for Coca-Cola and Nike, and featuring graphic artist Kaz Oomori, an official Disney artist, the collaborative work was created to the size of the temple's sliding doors, and the large-format graphics of the Acala statue are a sight to behold.


The "Special Exhibition Commemorating the 800th Anniversary of Unkei's Death" is being held at Gallery Shijohan, a renovated townhouse.

The venue, Shijohan, is one of three Kyoto row houses built in the early Showa period. It is a residential area in the city center that still retains its old-fashioned charm, with a famous public bath nearby and cobblestone streets that have been used for filming Kyoto dramas. Hattori Daisuke, the architect who handled the renovation, also has his office on the same street. He says, "I hope this will help consider the reuse of old townhouses in Kyoto, where land is being cleared."


"Special Exhibition Commemorating the 800th Anniversary of Unkei's Death" (@Shijohan)

Event Overview
Commemorating the 1st Anniversary of Shijohan "Special Exhibition Commemorating the 800th Anniversary of Unkei's Death" Jorakuji Temple x Munetaka Tokuyama x Kaz Oomori
Period: Sunday, April 23, 2023 - Sunday, May 7, 2023
Opening Hours: 12:00 PM to 7:00 PM (Last day until 1:00 PM)
Location: Alternative Space Shijohan 801-7 Takatsuji Nishinotoin-cho, Shimogyo-ku, Kyoto City
Admission: Free
●Talk event | May 4th, 3pm (Admission limited)

Text by Tatsuya Noda: Founding Editor-in-Chief of Fashion Headline

野田達哉