Dates｜November 1 – 24, 2025
Venue｜MEM map
Hours｜12:00 – 18:00（10:00 – 18:00 during ART WEEK TOKYO, Nov. 7-9）
Closed | Monday (Open if Monday is a public holiday, closed the following weekday)
Phone | 03-6459-3205

Talk Event: “Natsuko Tanihara’s Visions and Ambitions”
Date & Time: November 1 (Sat), 15:00-17:00
Speakers: Mayu Hiyama (Curator), Natsuko Tanihara
Admission: ¥1200 (reservation required, capacity of 20 people)
The event will also be streamed online. Please check the website for details.
An opening reception will follow the talk, continuing until 19:00

Held annually in Osaka, Nakanoshima Bunraku endeavors to make the traditional puppet theater of Ningyō Jōruri Bunraku more accessible to contemporary audiences. Natsuko Tanihara oversaw the stage art for both last year’s and this year’s productions. Projection mapping was incorporated into the stage production with Tanihara’s illustrations of Edo period figures and streetscapes, wisteria and cherry trees, the Tenjin Forest, and the Pure Land projected as part of the set design, changing with each scene.

While last year’s program featured four plays structured around the four seasons, this year’s production of The Love Suicides at Sonezaki allowed Tanihara to explore the theme of shinjū (double suicide), a theme she had long been eager to take on.

“There was a time when those who committed shinjū were said to be condemned to hell, and even if one survived, they faced execution or exile from society. And yet, lovers still believed in a Pure Land just for the two of them, surrendering themselves to the darkness. Love, the primal expression of life, and the path that leads to death, it is the traces of this contradiction that I have pursued with my brush.”

-Natsuko Tanihara

This exhibition brings together the original paintings created for Nakanoshima Bunraku and also features a new large-scale work exploring the theme of shinjū (double suicide).