Time Tunnel – Japan and the Jews

New Exhibition

Friday, 16.09.22, 10:00

Saturday, 22.04.23

curator:

Etty Glass Gisis

Accessible

More info:

04-6030800
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The exhibition "Time Tunnel – Japan and the Jews" marks 70 years of diplomatic relations between Japan and Israel. The exhibition focuses on the meeting point between Japan and the Jews through works of art by Japanese artists that relate to the Jewish narrative of rescue and extermination.

The rescue story is based on the humane gesture of the Japanese Vice-Consul in Kaunas, Lithuania, Chiune Sugihara, who, in the summer of 1940, issued over two thousand visas to Japan. In this way, Sugihara saved more than six thousand Jews. Alongside the video installation by SHIMURAbros, rare photographs from 1941 of the Tampei Photography Group are displayed, including photographs of the refugees who came to Japan.

At the center of the story of the extermination are the works of the artists Tatsuo Miyajima [installation and photography] and Yuki Onodera [photography]. The exhibition creates a tunnel that connects between times and cultures, here and there, and from then to now, which are expressed in the connection between the contemporary art and the old photographs and in the connections between us, alive today, and the history which is an important part of our identity. The works convey a universal message of humanity, tolerance, and understanding of difference, and this is the central point of connection of these contemporary Japanese artists to the Jewish narrative.

The exhibiton continues with three journeys between Israel and Japan: the journeys of the collector and museum founder Felix Tikotin; the journey of the artist Tetsuya Noda; and the journey of the artist Meirav Davish Ben Moshe. Three journeys, at different times, connecting the Jewish and Israeli local experiences with Japanese culture and art. The first Jews settled in Japan only in the middle of the 19th century. They came from all over Asia, Europe, and the United States and settled there for commercial interests. In Japan, unlike in Europe, Jews lived as a segregated community and did not integrate into society, so the foolish claim of a Jewish conspiracy to take over the world received little attention and anti-Semitism was a minor phenomenon.

From the Japanese point of view, the Jews were socially perceived as part of the foreigners who lived there, and religiously Judaism was considered to be Christian, and therefore did not stand out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

טויוטה ישראל | Toyota Israel

שגרירות יפן בישראל | Embassy of Japan in Israel

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