A Japanese Art Journey: A Curator's Memoir of Polka Dot Pumpkins, Paper Dolls and Woodblock Prints

In this engaging memoir, art historian and curator Meher McArthur transports you into the extraordinary world of Japanese art and museum collections. In a series of personal behind-the-scenes stories, McArthur showcases dozens of art objects--from traditional ceramics, swords, prints and textiles to folk painting, contemporary art and animation--that reveal a power to heal, provide escape and bring people from different cultures together. The author's highly personal accounts are interwoven with descriptions of exquisite artworks and artifacts. Fall in love with Japanese culture and art as you follow McArthur's journey from a student to a seasoned specialist.

The sections in this book each focus on a specific work of art that is described within the context of how Meher learns about it:

• First foray: McArthur's childhood in Scotland, where two Japanese women give her a paper doll--her first encounter with Japanese art!


• Islands of beauty: While living as a student in Japan and taking calligraphy lessons, McArthur receives a beautiful kimono and obis from a generous friend


• Heartbreak and healing: McArthur rushes back to the UK to care for her mother, who is suffering from leukemia, and she folds origami cranes for her--an act she'll poignantly recall years later when curating an exhibition of cranes folded by the famous Hiroshima atomic-bomb survivor, Sadako Sasaki


• A year of shards: Back in Japan to study ceramics, McArthur is aghast to learn that her brother, who also has leukemia, has relapsed. At the same time, her master's thesis strategy falls apart, and she must regroup


• Recollections of a curator: McArthur shares her trials and triumphs as a Japanese art curator, relating the meaning of wonderful artifacts like a samurai sword, Buddhist prints, folk paintings, bronze dragons and woodblock prints


• Spotted pumpkins and origami: McArthur deepens her appreciation of modern Japanese art during a stay on the "art island" of Naoshima, home to several giant pumpkin sculptures by Yayoi Kusama. She also coordinates traveling exhibitions of origami masterpieces, and assists with the exhibition of the work of Shinkai Makoto, a major Japanese animation artist