2016 Tokyo Art & Antiques event review

View of event at Maruzen, Nihonbashi, 3rd Floor Gallery

Although it was a little bit rainy on the first day of the 2016 Tokyo Art & Antiques, the weather was good on the following two days. The number of visitors varied from gallery to gallery, but there were around 250 visitors a day at the most in some of the galleries (based on participating store questionnaire results). According to the visitor surveys, quite a few people were first time visitors.

On the 14th, the first day of the event, we received coverage from the NHK Metropolitan Area Network in the morning. One of our executive committee members, Mr. Kiyofumi Ito from Gallery Kochukyo Co.Ltd, was interviewed and asked about the main idea of this event and the charity auction.

We also received coverage from TOKYO MX NEWS in the afternoon. They had previously taken pictures of some of the stores. They started broadcasting live at around 6:00 in the evening, and another executive committee member, Mr. Yasunao Hayashida from Gallery Hayashida was interviewed and asked about the main idea of this event.

Mr. Hideki Shiono from Gallery Seek and Mr. Shin Ishii from Shikisaisha were also interviewed, and they talked about the attractiveness of each of the exhibited works and how to enjoy those works.

The broadcast lasted for about 4 minutes. Before filming live, they had repeated rehearsals while recording the time again and again because they knew it was going to be live. There was a sense of tension until the end of the actual interviews, making for an interesting and rare experience for us.

This time there were a lot of attractions in the Tokyo Art & Antiques show. From 6:00 p.m. on the first day, Mr. Michael Steinbach had a gallery talk show at the World Antiquarian Book Plaza. On the second day, we had a special project, a round-table discussion with two guests, who were Ms. Ritsuko Yajima from the Machida City Museum and Ms. Sarah Sato from Tokiwayama Bunko Foundation. Mr. Tadashi Kawashima from MAYUYAMA & CO.,LTD. also had a gallery talk show (as well as one on the following day).

Gallery Talk: Birth of the Modern – Style and identity in Vienna 1900

Tokyo Art & Antiques 2016 × Machida City Museum × Tokiwayama Bunko Foundation Special Talk Session

Gallery Talk by Tadashi Kawashima on "Chinese Ceramics -The World of Overglaze Enamel Ware-" 

All the talk events were fully occupied, suggesting visitors' strong interest levels. Their requests in the questionnaire surveys conducted during the session showed their strong interest in talk shows and their motivation for learning.

In addition, at this Tokyo Art & Antiques show, we held our first ever charity auction. We hoped to recommend a good way to enjoy the art works so that people could feel a closer sense towards the art works, thus we planned this project to be held at Tokyo Art & Antiques.

Twelve of the participating Tokyo Art & Antiques galleries exhibited works that people could bid on at each gallery. There were a wide range of works at each store, from affordable ones for someone who just wanted to purchase a piece of art work for the first time to things bordering on mania. In some cases, participants won auctions at very reasonable prices. Some people were there with the charity auction in mind. The auction finished on the 17th. Each store plans to directly contact the winning bidders.

Some of the bid amounts will be donated to charity organizations, which was one of the purposes of this project. Each store will donate the money to a charity organization. We are going to report the donated amount on our web site after they have completed the procedure.

During the event, an exhibition was held at 48 stores, where a variety of works were displayed with elaborate ideas. Please see the event page for more details on the exhibitions from each store.

>>Event Page

We and other participating galleries continue to make efforts so that more and more people can enjoy our event. We are looking forward to meeting you at our next Tokyo Art & Antiques.