In commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, "Contemporary Art of the 1980s in Kansai" will be held. Why the 80s now? The museum’s predecessor institution used to hold a series of exhibitions called "Art Now” introducing contemporary artists that conveyed the state of the Kansai art scene. In the 1980s, artists still in their twenties participated in the exhibition, which became a stage for showcasing their most important works. The region was attracting attention with a "Kansai New Wave" of vibrant young artists, and because of the original expression unique to the area, contemporary art was said to be "high in the west and low in the east.”
The period of the bubble economy and post-modernism may seem glamorous in retrospect, but the artists now active in Japan and abroad were just starting out at that time. Their works, full of exciting colors and images, marked a drastic change from the ascetic tendencies of the 1970s. Reflecting questions of how to live as artists in a corner of Japan, they created a vocabulary of expression that has been carried forward to the present day. The works of art from Kansai in the 80s, which can be called the starting point of contemporary art, are unique and will surely provide us with hints for living better in this difficult time.
8 minute walk from Iwaya Station on the Hanshin line, 10 minute walk from the South exit of Nada Station on the JR Kobe line, 20 minute walk from the West exit of Oji-koen Station on the Hankyu line.
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