apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

We dropped in on a lark to look at Japanese prints, and the exhibition was beautiful and informative. But the reason I’ll mention it here is the way the exhibition was installed. Not only did the galleries provide a rejection of the typical “white box,” but the walls were painted in colors that I don’t normally associate with the Orient. I have a few installation views to illustrate what I mean.

Kitagawa Utamaro, "Women Gathering for a Tooth-Blackening Ceremony."

Everyone knows how much I love grey, and I never expected it to be so handsome in an art gallery. If our pink is feminine, then this is masculine without being obnoxious. It matches these prints by Utamaro (a personal favorite) toe to toe. The color looks like it’s been lifted out of a woodblock print.

Utagawa Kuniyoshi, "Benkei and Yoshitsune at the Battle of Dannoura."

Here it is again, my Butterfield-8 Blue, though this time it has nothing to do with Elizabeth Taylor in the 50s.

Purple’s tricky too, but here Plum and gold make a regal combination that doesn’t look like playschool, and doesn’t feel like the West. This, too, dovetails with my interest in “bruise colors” and bridges the gap between us and another place and time.

Katsushika Hokusai, "Chinese Boys Watching Tigers cross a River."

Mark Chamberlain, interior and decorative painter