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Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art: From Impressionism to Contemporary Art

Date：2025-01-22 - 2025-04-21
Location：Shanghai Museum East, Exhibition Gallery 2 (2F), Exhibition Gallery 3 (3F)
Organizer：Shanghai Museum, Pola Museum of Art, Nikkei Inc.
Lenders to the Exhibition：National Art Museum of China, Anhui Museum, Liu Haisu Art Museum
Special Support：CHINA EASTERN AIRLINES, ZHONG OU AMC, Alfilo Brands, OPPLE, ALL NIPPON AIRWAYS

Overview

Preface by the Director of the Shanghai Museum

The Shanghai Museum has been delving into Impressionism, which holds a great allure for numerous art enthusiasts in China; its exhibition, "Barbizon through Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute" in 2013 traced the origin of this movement; "La Naissancedes Beaux-Arts: du Grand Siècle à la Révolution" in 2019 probed into academic art, which has conventionally been seen as the antithesis to Impressionism; "Botticelli to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery, London" in 2023 presented Impressionism as one of the crucial turning points in art history; and now, "Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art: From Impressionism to Contemporary Art" marks the Museum's maiden endeavor to comprehensively engage its audiences in the magnificent vista of Impressionism, accompanied by an in-depth analysis of the movement in the realm of painting.

This exhibition assembles an array of remarkable works. It features the trailblazing creations of Impressionist icons such as Courbet and Manet. There are also the splendid plein-air masterpieces crafted by Monet, Pissarro, Sisley, and Renoir, along with the revolutionary ways in which Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin manipulated light and color. Moreover, it illustrates the profound imprint that Impressionism left on subsequent art movements like Fauvism, Cubism, and contemporary art, as exemplified by the works of maestros like Matisse, Vlaminck, Dufy, and Picasso. The exhibition, with its glittering showcase of over thirty legendary artists, presents an unforgettable artistic extravaganza for its viewers.

With the 2025-2026 period being officially designated as the China - Japan - South Korea Cultural Exchange Year, we are blessed with enhanced prospects for deeper understanding, broader accord, and closer cooperation through cultural, particularly artistic, exchanges. Japan stands as a prominent hub for Impressionist art collections in Asia. The Shanghai Museum is privileged to collaborate with the Pola Museum of Art and Nikkei Inc. in staging this exhibition, which ushers Pola Museum of Art's unique assemblage of modern and contemporary art into China for the first time. This represents Pola Museum of Art's first ever large-scale exhibition overseas. What is truly noteworthy is the extensive display of famous artists, the diverse array of their styles, and the profound historical import of their works during periods of significant transformation. It is not only an extraordinary cultural rendezvous and interchange between East and West but also a potent manifestation of Asian aesthetic sensibilities in art collecting.

Finally, I would like to extend my sincerest gratitude to our teams from both China and Japan for their commitment.

Chu Xiaobo

Director of the Shanghai Museum

Preface by the Director of the Pola Museum of Art

We are immensely honored to present the Pola Museum of Art's most ambitious overseas exhibition to date at the newly opened Shanghai Museum East in one of the world's hubs of art, Shanghai in spring 2025.

With the aim of creating "a symbiosis between Hakone's natural beauty and art", the Pola Museum of Art was founded in 2002 in Hakone-machi, Kanagawa Prefecture, nestled within the Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park. The Museum's collection is recognized as the leading private art collection in Japan for the 21^st century, distinguished by both its quality and quantity. This exhibition captures the essence and charm of the collection in its entirety.

The exhibits here are all core pieces from the collection of the Pola Museum of Art, spanning from the seminal works of French Impressionists such as Monet and Renoir, through the masterpieces of groundbreaking Post-Impressionists such as Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin, who were revered as trailblazers by modern painters, to the epochal creations of 20th-century masters such as Picasso, Braque, and Matisse. These artworks encapsulate the pivotal period from the late 19^th to the mid-20^th century in Western art history. This exhibition also celebrates the early 20th-century artistic dialogue between China and Japan, enhanced by contributions from museums in China. The Exhibition Gallery 3 presents our recent acquisitions of contemporary art, offering insights into the creativity of today's artists through photographs, videos, and installations. Acurated tribute to the Pola Museum of Art's dedication to showing the artists' love of nature and their pursuit of more powerful expressions of light and color, the whole exhibition provides a sophisticated and graceful aesthetic journey for its visitors.

We hope that this exhibition will share the Pola Museum of Art's splendor with a broader Chinese audience. Our deepest appreciation goes to Director Chu Xiaobo and his Shanghai Museum team for their enthusiasm for and commitment to making this event possible. We also thank Nikkei Inc. and all those who have supported this cultural endeavor.

May this exhibition offer its visitors animmersive and delightful experience.

Noguchi Hiroko

Director of the Pola Museum of Art

Highlights