To commemorate the tenth anniversary of its opening, JP Tower Museum INTERMEDIATHEQUE is holding the special exhibition “Birds in Paradise.”
The present exhibition is organized by the University Museum, the University of Tokyo (UMUT) and L’ÉCOLE School of Jewelry Arts, an initiation school aiming to introduce the public to all aspects of jewelry culture and created in 2012 with the support of the French High Jewelry Maison Van Cleef & Arpels. a French institution specializing in education and research on jewelry. It will present historical masterpieces of jewelry with birds as a motif, alongside first-grade Natural History specimens including bird taxidermy specimens as well as related scientific documents. Jewelry, Natural History specimens, drawings: with this dialogue between birds, both real and rendered through various means of expression, we will both explore how birds have been described scientifically and researched upon, and how they have been depicted through drawings, to see how these forms of expression inspired the craftsmanship of jewelry.
These richly ornamental birds, crafted according to the highest techniques onto the most precious materials, can be seen as a summit of crafts. On the other hand, in order to understand the jewelry artists’ viewpoints, it is essential to turn to the actual birds that inspired them in creating their works. For the first time in Japan, about one hundred masterpieces of jewelry depicting birds crafted by various artists and maisons, from the mid-19th century to the contemporary era, will be shown alongside a selection of essential Natural History specimens from the collections of the University Museum, the University of Tokyo (UMUT) as well as the Yamashina Institute of Ornithology. From this selection, we will focus on historical specimens and drawings of birds, thus staging a dialogue on birds from the perspective of Art and Science.
In this exhibition, the visitors will also be able to know more about the biological meaning of the diversity in bird coloration and plumage, and how that has inspired human design, while experiencing the enigmatic evolution of birds defying human imagination. From the standpoint of Natural Sciences, we will also focus on the birds of paradise – which partly inspired the exhibition title. Birds of paradise are aptly named because of their sheer beauty, but this poetic name hides a complex history with many legends, also pertaining to their preservation.
The scenography of the present exhibition will fittingly transform the Intermediatheque into a poetic space developing from night birds to daytime birds and then to birds of fantasy, going from obscurity to light and then to a world of fantasy.
INTERMEDIATHEQUE Exhibition Page http://www.intermediatheque.jp/en/schedule/view/id/IMT0257
