MUSEC participates in the MIA Photo Fair in Milan

From 7 to 10 October, MUSEC will be at the MIA Photo Fair in Milan (Superstudio Maxi) with an exhibition entitled "Artificial Japan. Photographs of the Yokohama School. 1860-1910".

The exhibition offers the public a selection of works of extraordinary beauty chosen from among the thousands of works by the Yokohama School kept at MUSEC. The photographs of the "Ada Ceschin and Rosanna Pilone" Foundation were produced in Japan by European and local photographers between the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century and were essentially created to satisfy the exotic tastes of tourists who were passionate about the Far East.

The images illustrate a world that in many cases was recreated to perfection in the photographic studios of the time: a world with an ancient flavour that in reality was rapidly disappearing under the influence of modernisation and westernisation.

The photographs on show at MIA Photo Fair present a recreated reality, but also the small ancient world of traditional Japan that was already in the process of being historicised.
Its protagonists, such as geishas, kendoka, sumo wrestlers, kabuki actors and samurai, to name but a few, offer Westerners an aesthetic vision of Japan, through artfully reconstructed scenes of everyday life and gender stereotypes in a society that is already in the process of being westernised.
and gender stereotypes in a stratified society in the throes of change.

MIA Artificial Japan