Sendai City Museum
Performing arts groups, most notably the Metropolitan Opera, may be having second thoughts about their scheduled trips to Japan (as Robin Pogrebin reported in yesterday’s NY Times). But the Boston Museum of Fine Arts is a trooper and the Sendai City Museum is a survivor: The BMFA’s The Golden Age of Color Prints: Ukiyo-e from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (scroll down), an exhibition of some 140 woodblock prints, is still on track to open June 24 at the Sendai City Museum.
Traveling to Sendai: Kitagawa Utamaro, “Love that Rarely Meets,” about 1793-94, Boston Museum of Fine Arts
According to its website, the Sendai City Museum was “totally renewed in 1986.” It was apparently built to last: Although located near the epicenter of the recent devastating earthquake, it still stands.
Amelia Kantrovitz, a BMFA spokesperson, told me last week :
We have been in touch with our colleagues at the City Museum of Sendai
and understand that the museum suffered only minor damages, and that
they are prepared to hold the exhibition….We will continue
to work with the exhibition organizers and, if they feel safe
continuing, we plan to honor our commitments.The Museum of Fine
Arts, Boston, has a longstanding relationship with Japan that
dates back to the 19th century. In 1890, the MFA became the first
museum in America to establish a Japanese collection and appoint a
curator specializing in Japanese art. Today, the Museum’s Asian art
collection, in particular the art of Japan, is considered one of the
finest in the world.
The BMFA also has a satellite museum in Nagoya, out of harm’s way—about 160 miles south of Tokyo and 300 miles from Sendai.