GB: Welcome everybody. I'm Geoff Batchen, I'm the host of the Radio Hour. Every Wednesday evening
I have the pleasure and honour of interviewing a guest about their practise as an art historian.
It's recorded, and so you can find podcast versions of these conversations on our website.
The University of Oxford. The idea is literally to treat it like radio.
My guest and I chat and you can wander around in your pyjamas, sipping wine or making dinner or whatever else you might want to do while we talk.
I'll just remind you that at about the 45 minute mark,
you're more than welcome to send questions in for Linda to answer using the chat function on teams.
And then I'll read out those questions and invite later to respond to them.
I'll remind you about that mark, in case you've been thinking up a great question between now and then.
So I'm very happy to welcome Lena Fritsch, who is the curator of modern and contemporary art at the Ashmolean Museum and who
is the co-curator of an important exhibition that is currently up in that museum.
'Tokyo art and photography' and certainly part of our conversation is going to be about that exhibition.
But let me first ask you, Lena, you grew up in Germany. How did you come to specialise in Japanese language and culture?
LF: Well, first of all, thank you for having me. Well, actually, you say I grew up in Germany, but I actually lived in Japan when I was four, too
We moved to Japan when I was four and a half years old and then until I was about six.
So one and a half, almost two years, I actually lived in Japan, in Osaka.
My mother is a musicologist with a focus on Japanese music.
And she had a scholarship at the time and was doing research in Osaka.
And so that's yeah, that's how I first encountered Japan. And so Japanese is my second language, and I have a very close relationship with Japan.
And so my interest in Japanese art is basically rooted in, you know, in this in this close link to Japan.
That's just part of my biography. GB: I noticed you won prizes, the speeches in Japanese, at quite a young age.
So beyond just living, I mean, living there from four to six is one thing.
But then to continue to study it in such a fashion, presumably you've done that, you know, all your life, it sounds like.
LF: Yes. I mean, I'm very grateful to my mother now. I absolutely hated it when I was younger.
But once we moved back to Germany, I went to a Japanese school every Saturday for a few hours, and I used to have Japanese babysitters.
And so she made sure that I that I don't forget it. And so basically,
I've never lost the Japanese language. There was a phase when I had a kind of kindergarten style Japanese, I had to cut off and move on from that.
But basically, I never, never lost it, which is, I mean, it's amazing
it's just so much easier as a child to learn a new language.
And so I'm very grateful that she actually was quite strict about it to make sure that I that I didn't lose the language.
GB: Yeah. Now when you came to write your Ph.D. in art history, you chose to write about Japanese art photography of the 1990s.
I'm interested in how you came to make that decision. So I guess Japanese was obvious, but the photography part perhaps less obvious.
I'm especially interested in the 1990s because there's been quite a lot of work
and indeed celebration of Japanese photography of the late 60s and early 70s.
Why did you pick to choose to write about photography and then why the 1990s in particular?
LF: Well, basically, actually, we would have to go back a little bit more.
So when I was thinking about my master's thesis, my supervisor at the time suggested that I do something about Morimura Yasumasa.
Who, as you know, is appropriation artist who dresses up, as you know, film stars, different artists.
And so he's a photographic artist, so he works with photography.
But yeah, he's kind of often seen in this context of appropriation art, and he became quite big in the 80s and 90s.
And when I started researching his work for my master's thesis,
I realised that there were so many other artists who did interesting things in Japan in the 1990s.
And so basically my Ph.D. theme grew out of this interest in Morimura
and then I was looking at artists such as [INAUDIBLE]
other artists, photographers whose work were shown, particularly in the West as of the 1990s,
and from there I then actually became interested also in the 70s and the 80s.
And, you know, the photography that's probably better known in the West,
but it kind of grew out of this of these exhibitions that you know, you would see in Europe and in the US in the early 2000s.
GB: It's kind of interesting about figures like Morimura because in a way,
his popularity opened the door for a lot of lesser known figures to become better known.
LF: Yeah, and and he was super nice. You know, I mean, I was just a student and I contacted him when I when I lived in Tokyo and
he was happy to meet me and to tell me about his work.
And so it was also kind of, you know, meeting artists that then make me really interested in,
you know, doing a PhD and following that whole that whole path.
GB: Now you had a book, I guess, based on this Ph.D. 'Ravens and red lipstick', Japanese art photography since 1945.
And I noticed that, oh,
I know that one of the things that you argue in the book is that there's been a somewhat cliched understanding of Japanese photography since 1945.
And you saw your book as attempting to provide a counter argument by providing a more contextual interpretation.
but I'm just wondering what that means and how you think
the book shifted our perception of Japanese photography since 45.
LF: Yeah. So basically, I had already published my Ph.D. by that time
and so my Ph.D. is this like 350 pages book very academic, obviously.
Andthe German system is basically you only get your doctor's title if you've published your thesis.
So you have to, you know, kind of make sure that the thesis is readable and nice so you can actually publish it as a book.
And that was earlier that was in 2012 that it came out.
And so 'Ravens and red lipstick', which came out in 2018,
was actually that I was trying to come up with a kind of introduction into Japanese photography in English.
For people who don't know much about Japanese photography, but who might like Japanese photography,
who might have seen some Araki photographs and became curious and wanted to find out more.
So it really is a kind of coffee table book. I call it a meaningful coffee table book, which is really, for wider audience,
as opposed to the kind of very academic PhD thesis that I wrote before.
And yeah, I mean, there was no book that kind of tried to provide an overview on Japanese photography since 1945.
And of course, I could have done an even bigger project kind of going back further.
But it just became too much. And so then I decided, OK, let's just focus on like as of 1945.
And to be honest, it also grew out because at the time I was still working at Tate Modern when we started thinking about the project,
and Tate has quite a good collection of Japanese photographs.
And so originally the idea was that I would really focus on Tate's holdings, and that kind of became a bit boring because I thought,
why am I actually only focussing on the photographs that actually are in the collection? I would like to do this independently, and I want to
be the one who chooses which photos I include rather than the institution.
And then, yeah, and then it happened that actually, the head of publication editor at the time moved to Thames & Hudson.
And so I thought, OK, why don't I just follow up with him? He likes the project.
He's enthusiastic about it. Maybe we do a proper book out of it rather than a take book.
And that's how it actually came about.
GB: And you mentioned before the capacity to do interviews, and I know part of the book is interviews with the photographers.
So is this for you an important tool research tool you find?
LF: Yes, a very important research tool.
And I guess particularly with Japanese art and artists that are of a certain generation, many Japanese artists don't speak any English.
I mean, the younger generation people in their 20s and 30s, it has changed a bit.
But people who are older than that, usually they don't really speak any English.
And so they really appreciate if you speak their language and if you're interested in their work and they're so into the aesthetic,
So I just really enjoy talking to artists, I guess.
And so therefore it's an important research tool and it's a it's a fun research tool as well.
And I always think that art really comes to life. You know, when you talk to the artists. It's different
when you kind of write an academic text, then I think it's actually really important to look at the works first and not only listen to the artist,
but if it's something like, you know, write 'Ravens and Red lipstick', it has to be entertaining as well, and people are interested in the stories.
And so, yeah, it's probably my favourite part about the book, all those interviews GB: You had worked for a museum in Berlin,
but I was wondering, were you looking to move to Britain and what was the difference between working
I know at a relatively low level as a curator in Berlin and then similarly, an assistant curator position here.
Did you notice the difference between this sort of British museum scene and the German one?
LF: Oh, that's a good question. I guess it's quite difficult because
I only worked at the National Museums Berlin, first, and then the Director General
and then at Hamburger Bahnhof and then the post at Tate Modern came up,
which was an assistant curator role but with a focus on the Asia-Pacific region,
and they were deliberately looking for someone who either speaks a Chinese language or a Japanese.
And so it was an opportunity to do something, you know, with art from that region.
And there just not many posts out there where you can actually do, you know, Japanese and Korean and Chinese and what whole Asia Pacific region,
including Australian art as well, actually, where you can do modern contemporary art with a focus on that area in Europe.
So Tate was basically the only place where you could do something like that.
And so it was not so much a decision to come to the UK, but it was more a decision to come to Tate.
GB: I did notice that, you know, sort of broad range of projects while you're at Tate.
Everything from Giacometti and Agnes Martin to say three Australian artists names.
Of course I recognised. Now, is this a good thing or a bad thing to have those diversities, because it stretches so thin, did you find yourself losing scholarly substance?
Or was it a really, I don't know, energising range of things to do?
LF: Well, I think for me as a curator, it was really energising.
It was really good because for the collection work, I was focussing on the Asia Pacific region, although, yeah, it's a massive region.
But yes, so that was, you know, kind of that was all that I kind of really focussed on.
But then for exhibition projects, I was basically assigned the Agnes Martin exhibition.
I didn't choose to work on that, but I was just assigned to it.
And it was a great opportunity because I was not a big Agnes Martin fan before, but
if you're forced to work, you know, and really focus on her work for two years, then you probably become an Agnes Martin fan.
And it was a big show that then travelled to the Guggenheim and to Lakma and also to Dusseldorf, to the K20.
So, you know, kind of working on such a big touring exhibition with these big international museum partners
for me at the time was a great and new experience and something where I really learnt a lot.
Yes and I kind of kept focussing on that one area, but in terms of curatorial work,
I'm quite glad that I've been able to work on really different projects.
GB: Let me ask the difficult question about Agnes Martin, because it's often debated and will be debated by my students tomorrow as it happens.
Does the sexuality matter to her art? Is that something that scholars or curators need to discuss or even mention?
What's your view on this? LF: Probably not.
I guess it depends on the focus of analysis.
And if you know,
it probably depends on what your essay or what your theme is when you're kind of looking at the works of art. In terms of an exhibition,
We kind of I remember that we had that debate.
At what point do we actually mention her sexuality and also even more so her, you know, schizophrenia and her kind of mental problems.
And the exhibition at Tate, we decided to do that and room four so kind of, you know, people have the opportunity to first look at the works,
we kind of introduced to work with kind of the most well known kind of works, you know, fairly late works, actually.
And then we kind of started with, you know, chronological approach to show that this rather unknown, really early works,
kind of her context also the idea, the other artists that she met and and then in the fourth room,
we kind of when she decides to really move away, be on her own to kind of, you know, live that kind of more reclusive lifestyle.
That's the moment when actually mentioned, you know, she had kind of breakdown.
That was the reason why she then left and decided to to live like that.
So at that point when it kind of became important in the narrative, we mentioned it.
But before that we just thought it's not really necessary and important for the works of art.
So why tell visitors all that? You know, it's kind of just makes it a bit kind of spectacular.
So it's not really important to understand the works of art GB: And her sexuality
is it relevant to understanding her work or irrelevant? LF: I think it's probably looking at most of the works.
I mean, it's probably irrelevant. Yeah, I mean, it's abstract.
It's not like she's kind of painting the female body or any kind of sexual encounters or anything like that.
Not at all.
GB: So. You joined the Ashmolean as its very first curator of modern and contemporary art.
I'm just wondering what kind of changes in the Ashmolean zone self-conception did it require for them to imagine having a curator like yourself?
LF: Well, I think they just really finally wanted to have someone who focuses on modern and contemporary art.
And for me, it was just an opportunity to kind of get out of that really, you know, like contemporary art scene.
And I thought it would be interesting to work somewhere where you have, you know,
where you have art history together with kind of, you know, the modern and contemporary scene.
And that was that was quite attractive for me.
And then the link to the university was also something that I found attractive and that I actually missed a little bit at Tate
Sometimes that, you know, when you kind of work so hard and it's such a fast paced kind of aggressive environment in a way.
So I thought I sometimes missed, you know, just having time for research.
And actually and I mean, I don't have that much time for myself to write, but a little bit more.
You know, at least it's part of your job description and part of our role to do research so you can actually fight for it.
And you can say, I need now time to write this essay and give me, you know, head space to do research.
GB: It must be interesting to, I mean, to be obviously a large part of the audience is not the university,
but nevertheless the museum is constantly in conversation with different parts of the university and its community.
But you must find it's a slightly different kind of audience that you have to engage.
LF: Yes. I mean, of course, it's a different audience, and it's also an audience that's also used to modern and contemporary art at the Ashmolean,
so that's sometimes a bit more challenging or colleagues who are kind of, you know, just not so used to it.
GB: And is there a collection strategy in place?
I mean, is the Ashmolean now actively collecting modern and contemporary in a way that it hasn't in the past?
Well, there was no collection strategy when I joined, so that was actually one of the first things that I kind of asked for and then that I
wrote together consulting with all the different colleagues in the different departments.
And well, basically, there are certain areas in the collection that are already quite interesting and where we then kind of try to build on.
So, you know, modern Chinese ink paintings,
that's an area that's already quite strong at the Ashmolean, that actually isn't so strong in any other UK museums.
So that's an area that we continue to build on.
And then German Neo Expressionist works on paper happen to be an area where actually we already had some holdings kind of randomly.
And so I decided that that's an area that I would like to build on.
So it was, yeah, always thinking about what do other museums in the country focus on and what do they do?
And then also, of course, museums and Oxford, we don't want to really duplicate collections.
And then you know what makes sense within the whole collection.
And yeah, so it's kind of which sounds all very strategic.
But of course, there are sometimes, you know, opportunities that arise and where you then don't really want to say no,
although it doesn't really fit 100 percent into our collection strategy.
GB: I mean, I'm just wondering then I mean, I know there's a room devoted to European American modernism.
I can't remember too much American there, actually, but it's given the overall shape of the Ashmolean.
It's a pretty minor element. But is there a plan to build that up into a larger proportion of the museum's exhibition weight?
If you know what I mean? GB: For the exhibitions, I think not so much, but for displays.
I mean, you know, there are also things that we have in storage that are never on view.
So that's something I think for the future that the museum is thinking about.
How can we show more of what we actually have? Are our spaces enough and so there are all these different conversations.
It's important to kind of be strategic about it as much as we can,
because otherwise we just have these random collections that can't really be just displayed together.
GB: Yeah, yeah. Of course. You've had an opportunity to do a few temporary exhibitions.
I did want to ask you about one of them, the the one of the work of the Sudanese artist Ibrahim El Salahi,
who caught my eye because he's kind of a part of a generation of Commonwealth
artists who came to England to study and then went back to their own countries,
and both Australians and New Zealanders who were probably in conversation with El Salahi
when he was here. How did that exhibition come about?
And I'm just wondering how you, for example,
place that exhibition in relation to the Ashmolean collections and then I'm just interested in that show in particular.
LF: Mm-Hmm. Yes, that was my first exhibition that I did at the Ashmolean,
and that was also kind of a in a way, strategic decision or something that I kind of I don't,
you know, it was my little message because it was the first show by a black artist at the museum.
And he had, I mean, the main reason to show him.
One of the main reasons to show him was that he's actually based in Oxford and that he has been living for over 20 years in Oxford.
And so there's this artist who's shown, you know,
he had quite a big moment where he has been better known and the kind of contemporary art world since about ten years ago.
And so I thought, well, why does he have actually a big retrospective at Tate Modern?
He actually was also yet the first [INAUDIBLE]
[INAUDIBLE]
And, you know, at other places, and he's in the collection of MoMA and you know, all these big museums have his work,
but he has been living in Oxford for a long time, and Oxford doesn't really show his work and it's his hometown.
And so that really was one of the reasons why I thought we have to show his work.
And I really like his work, and he's quite elderly.
So it also felt, you know, it's it's time to do this now. Well, he's still alive and what we can talk to him.
And then the other reason was that we wanted to do something that kind of links to the museum.
Of course. I mean, all the shows that we do, we try to kind of, you know, we always say,
why this exhibition now and why at the museum and to why at the Ashmolean for Ibrahim was not only that,
because he's based in Oxford, but also because we have a really good collection of ancient Sudanese material, and he's really interested.
I knew that he was really interested in these ancient Sudanese collections.
And so he came in here to look at the works, and so we exhibited his work alongside some ancient Sudanese
objects so worked closely together with them, my colleague Liam, from the from the Antiquities Department of the Museum.
And yeah,
so it became a project that can only be done at the Ashmolean and that can't be done at MoMA or its or any other kind of white cube alignment.
And I think that was quite refreshing to see his work in that context. So nice to work with him.
GB: Yeah. You know, I think of him among a range of other similar artists who represent a kind of regional modernism or local modernism,
rather than international high modernism that most like Tate Modern and MoMA tend to privilege.
So I'm just wondering whether that could be one of the roles the Ashmolean plays in its modern and contemporary exhibitions is to
showcase these kind of regional modernisms that otherwise don't get much attention.
LF: I guess if they link to the collection, then yes, you know, there is already something in our more historic collections that can justify that.
I think then, yes, definitely. And I'm very glad that we actually acquired a few works by Ibrahim after the exhibition.
But of course, the question is always Where do I now show those works?
So I have them in the ancient Sudanese gallery. It is like the works just before it happens and just before the first lockdown,
so they went on view for quite a while, but not that many people probably noticed them.
But you know, basically at the moment the only place where I can show them because they don't really fit anywhere else in the museum.
Yes. And that's, you know, sometimes that that's then also the the trouble because I always want to acquire something.
I wonder, how can we actually show this? And if we can't ever show it, that's a bit tricky to actually acquire it.
GB: It's like most other means most museums around the world, the Ashmolean, there's more space.
That's a bigger conversation, maybe. So let's talk about let's talk about the space you're filling now.
You and Claire Pollard have co-curated Tokyo art and photography, amazing reviews.
And when I've been in there, lots of enthusiastic audience, which is fantastic.
But of course, the obvious question speaking as a photo person is why the 'and'?
LF: I know. Well, the Turkish art and photography is the title of the exhibition, and it is a bit of a stupid title.
Look, you have to think about marketing. So we thought if we say because we were thinking about.
So originally, the title was supposed to be Tokyo stories, which is, you know, the name of a famous film.
And we thought it kind of conveys very nicely that
We wanted to have a kind of narrative approach where it's all about different stories in the cities,
not one story, but different stories, different points or people, you know?
And then I think, Oh yeah, then actually turns out that there was a photo show in Paris by Mark...
Well, a Japanese photo specialist actually with the same title.
Tokyo stories. So I thought, OK, that's not ideal really to choose the same title.
And then also we have, you know, all these lengthy conversations with our marketing colleagues.
And in the end,
Tokyo stories just didn't seem strong enough because it also sounded a little bit like it could be a literature exhibition or something,
you know, with books or so and not really an art exhibition. So if it's an art exhibition, you should have the word art in there,
maybe because otherwise people might also think it's a kind of architectural structure,
or it's just all about kind of the urban structure of the city.
So Tokyo art, and then I thought, OK, well, there's going to be a lot of photography in it.
We should put photography into the title just so people know. And then that's how art and photography then came about.
And we thought, art sounds very kind of timeless
Whereas photography, obviously, by the nature of the photographic medium suggests it's not 16th century work, but it's actually more modern.
And so in the title, we kind of also have the title suggests that it's an exhibition that has historic works in it,
but definitely also modern and contemporary works, and that's how we chose the title.
GB: It's amazing the back story to these seemingly obvious things.
So, you know, as I'm walking through, I'm thinking, I'm trying to think as a fellow curator,
how you and Claire would have strategized how you were going to deal with this challenge.
How do you tell the story of a city that's several hundred years old, inhabited by thirty seven million people?
It's obviously huge and vast and diverse, and I presume your first decision was, well,
we're not going to just tell a chronological survey type story, but you chose instead three themes.
Perhaps you could briefly describe what those themes are,
but also why you thought those three themes were the most appropriate ones to organise an exhibition around.
LF: So the themes are the city, then people, people living in the city and their lives in the city.
And then the third theme is artistic innovation.
The first one suggests the city as in the urban structure and kind of how how does the city actually look like?
That was fairly obvious that, you know,
we wanted to kind of introduce the city also to people who might have never been to Tokyo or who just really like,
you know, depictions of the city. And the people, was fairly straightforward because we, you know, I mentioned Tokyo stories before.
So it was all about kind of the stories of the city, the stories of the people.
And so this narrative elements, it all comes down to the people as well as an artistic innovation is everything in a way.
So the third room was really at the third theme is a bit of a, kind of well, we have three rooms in the exhibition.
So that's basically by -the architecture of the museum is - you have three main rooms.
And so there was a time when we were thinking, should we have three or four themes? And then we decided, Okay, let's just stick to three themes.
So it's really kind of obvious when you got to walk from one room to the other that then that kind of next chapter of the exhibition starts.
But yeah, the artistic innovation one that was the one that we thought about the longest and which is, yeah,
it's not the perfect thing because obviously there are works in the first two rooms that are innovative artistically as well.
But it was also. Is it kind of modern and contemporary works in there just to find that they just, you know,
they have to be in that because they're very innovative and they're very avant garde.
And we wanted to show that Tokyo, you know, really became a kind of hub for international artists and for,
because I think it's a kind of global art history story often suggests that after the war,
it was New York where everything happened and other big kind of cities get forgotten a bit. Particularly more Asian cities
where actually there was a lot of exchange between different artists and artists from different backgrounds.
And so we wanted to really highlight Tokyo as a hub of innovation and avant-garde artists as well.
GB: I mean, I can understand that, but when you do go into the fourth room, I mean, a lot of the art on display,
not all of it, but a lot of it seems to reference offshore, you know, psychedelic posters or surrealism.
you begin to see the influence of European art on Japanese art.
So perhaps you could explain to us what exactly constitutes innovation in this sense?
I mean, in other words, up to that point, it seems very Japanese centric.
Most of the work we've seen in the first two rooms, but when we get to the artistic innovation section,
the work begins to look more international if that's an appropriate word for it.
LF: Mm-Hmm. Yes. Well, I guess it's kind of, you know, it was.
It's also about artistic exchange that we kind of wanted to show.
So of course, there's the Western influence, but maybe also, you know, kind of the linking of Japanese tradition with new influences.
And for, you know, for example, those those kind of surrealist works.
For me, it was quite key to include those to also show, you know, that there were these surrealist works actually made in Japan.
Many people don't know that many people associate surrealism really only with France and Paris, and, you know, not really beyond that.
And now there's this kind of interest in global surrealism. And there's research in that field and there are exhibitions that are coming up now.
And so it was kind of key for me to include those plaques to show that there was actually interest in surrealism.
And it's a very specific, unique style. It's not just surrealist, it's actually very Japanese.
So I guess that's where the innovation part comes in.
And yeah, innovation also in terms of, yes, the artistic exchange.
I still think that the works are very uniquely Japanese, despite showing influences from from other other cultures.
GB: Is that the case even with the psychedelic wall? LF: The pop wall?
So the Tokyo pop wall. Well, if we look at I mean, they're extremely two dimensional, which is traditionally Japanese.
So in a way, you could argue that it was Japan was even before Western art history,
they were more modern because they were, you know, they were always abstract. In that sense, there were always two dimensional.
It was they were never trying to be realist like the Europeans.
So I guess, you know, that kind of pop aesthetic just just found a perfect context in Japanese art history because it
was already really flat and it linked very nicely with that kind of woodblock print aesthetic.
GB: I was imagining that you and Claire had some sleepless nights during the pandemic.
It's a very difficult situation in which to organise an exhibition.
Were there any key loans that you were unable to get, either because of the pandemic or for any other reason?
LF: Yes, I mean, there are two main kind of challenges.
And so one was there was loans from other countries that we had to just cut because of financial reasons.
So we had a few important works from other European collections that we couldn't include.
And then we also had works that were all for the same reason just weren't financially too difficult.
So, for example, we had works by a woman artist, Matsui Fuyuko,
who is now represented in the show with one rather small work, in the last three images
This kind of angel that's kind of, you know, kind of opening up its body, very kind of dark work.
And originally we wanted to have more key works by this artist, actually three large screens,
but because we would have had to build a kind of glass in front of those glass to protect them appropriately.
It would have been a really expensive thing to do. And so, yeah, there were massive budget cuts, of course,
because if you can't have as many people in the exhibition sell as many tickets
means the exhibition budget is smaller and then you have to work with that.
And then the other issue was also just thinking about visitor flow and to enable more social distancing.
So it could have been that, you know, we didn't really know what the situation would be when we opened at the end of July.
So it could have been that, you know, we would have had to be even more strict about kind of visitor numbers and all that.
So it was important to keep enough space and also in terms of the design at the kind of architecture.
But to be honest, in a way, I quite like minimal design anyway.
So sometimes it was actually easier for me because I then had an argument and could say, Oh,
we can't really do this because it's too expensive and we need to think about space and visitors need space now because of Covid.
So, yeah, but yeah, it was challenging, of course. Yeah, yeah.
GB: Now, I mean, the other thing that struck me when I first went was how the experience of the exhibition cut across,
perhaps even my own expectations about Tokyo, a city I have been to.
But I came away from it thinking, yeah, very clean, very orderly, high degree of social etiquette and decorum.
But when I came through your exhibition, I offered witness the other to
All of those things: chaos, destruction, social edginess.
So I was wondering whether you include deliberately tried to counter this clichéd view of Tokyo or whether this,
in fact, is the way Tokyo was being represented by its artists. And it just we in the West prefer not to see it that way.
LF: I think countering cliches was super important to us, for sure.
I mean, for me, as I mentioned, you know, I used to live in Japan as a child,
so I really know Japan quite well and I've been going back, you know, basically, yeah, all the time.
I've lived there many times. I've gone back many times since.
So it's important to me to not do the kind of cliche exhibition where you just, you know, celebrate all those stereotypes that visitors want to see.
So that was very important to me, but it was also equally important to Claire. We both said we didn't want to- in Japanese you say
You say, Fujiyama Geisha?
So the kind of, you know, Western, if you show the pretty side of the mountain and you show Geisha and you know, we didn't want that.
So that was important. And for for Tokyo, I guess there's also this image that it's a super futuristic kind of Blade Runner style city,
although it depends on which generation of you know, you talk to.
The younger people might not see it like that anymore, but you know, slightly the older people maybe have that kind of image.
And yeah, that's one side of Tokyo, but there is also a very different side.
And so, yeah, it was important to show different views of the city and to talk to artists.
So for me, you know, talking back, coming back to the whole interview points,
it was always a key feature for me in the book and also in the exhibition that I asked all the living artists what Tokyo means to them.
And I tried to include their own quotes as much as I could, also on the labels just to get their voices across.
And so it's because we are both, you know, not despite our close relationship with Japan.
We both not Japanese. So it was important to have these Japanese voices in there as well.
GB: Yeah, I mean, you have a major installation by Daido Moriyama.
Was he the patron saint of the exhibition? Because I did wonder whether his sort of I'm going to call it existential aesthetic was
something that you and Claire kind of tried to extend to the exhibition as a whole.
There's a very physical quality to the way, well, the way we encounter his photographs, with the way he takes them.
And there's something quite physical about moving through that exhibition.
It's almost like you're assaulted in some places by, I don't know, just the sheer number of images,
but also that that sense of chaos and danger that many of the works seem to convey.
LF: it's interesting that you say that because I haven't really have really thought about it that way.
But yeah, I mean, for me, thinking about photography and Tokyo, Moriyama was, of course,
kind of a key figure because he's he's like so intertwined with the city and he walks around the city.
And so much of his work is about Tokyo and well same with Araki I guess, I mean, there's some photographers where it's just,
you know, they are so active in Tokyo, and so much about their work
It's about the city.
So, yeah, it was important to to include Moriyama, and I thought, Well, Araki is so well known already in the West, and Moriyama
in the photography world is also already very well known,
but I thought that Oxford probably he isn't or the kind of general rider kind of artsy, he probably isn't.
So I wanted to, you know, kind of feature his work quite prominently. It conveys the atmosphere of Tokyo quite well.
GB: I think his quite Moriyama is one of those figures where people in the art world can identify one picture the one of the dog.
But I don't think many people are actually that familiar with the range of his work or the diversity of his work really well.
So what I was thinking about laner is, for example, is the interplay, the conversation between the prints,
which often 19th century and the photographs, which are most of the 20th century.
The prints are often somewhat stately and beautifully, I mean, in terms of the way they compose beautifully composed.
There is a kind of serenity to them, but whenever I came to a bank of photographs, it's like a very different aesthetic,
as if the photographer is almost running against the grain of traditional Japanese printmaking traditions.
So I wonder if , as curators, one in one invested in printmaking and the other were interested in photography,
whether you noticed that conversation as you were hanging the show.
LF: Yeah, for sure, and we often, you know, when we were looking at the workplace.
And you already kind of noticed there's like little, you know,
kind of comparisons and similarities and also really strong juxtapositions and be quite like that because the city is,
you know, it is full of kind of juxtapositions. And so we thought, why not?
GB: And this is a question, do you feel like you learnt something in doing the exhibition that you didn't already know?
Because obviously one of the richness of the exhibition is a constant reminder of how rich the Ashmolean's own collections are.
So I'm sure that as you and Claire are putting together a checklist, you're thinking, Oh, we must use that screen and we must.
But I'm wondering if you felt at the end of the show you would actually learn something about,
for example, Japan or Japanese art that you hadn't already known. LF: Well, I learnt from Claire because I'm not a woodblock print specialist.
And so I definitely learnt about kind of more historic art from her.
And I think for her, she was not so familiar with with the modern contemporary side of things.
So in that sense, you know, just two curators working together who kind of learn from each other.
That was that was really nice, actually was a really good experience because I'm sure, as you know,
kind of not always, if you kind of co-curator show it's a very harmonious, friendly, nice experience.
For us it really was. GB: Yeah, I was going to ask you whether co-creating is more difficult than single curating, but I guess there's benefits and tensions.
LF: I find it more difficult. Usually, I find quite co-curating more difficult.
But, you know, speaking from experience, kind of working with other big, you know, estates,
for example, Artists Estates who are then, you know, involved or so it can be quite tricky.
But with with Claire and I, because also, I mean,
it's so clear kind of where our different expertise lies that it's very easy to then just trust each other and have a good conversation.
So no, for us in this case, it was way too easy, but usually I find it easier to just do it on my own.
GB: Yeah. And why did you think there was a need for, for example, for a set of samurai armour?
I mean, was that a necessary component or it just happened?
We happened to have one in the collection? LF: No, we thought it is actually.
I mean, of course, you know, if you do an exhibition like this and it's a summer exhibition, then you also need to please different visitors.
And so. Amurai Armour, we thought was expected by some visitors, but we also thought it's important to show, you know,
the link between Japanese art and samurai because many people don't really,
know that they're, you know how closely associated there was Japanese culture.
They just see them as warriors. But you know, they were art patrons and and they did the tea ceremony and so,
we wanted to show that at least, you know, represent that at least a little bit. 422 GB: I mean, the other sort of theme strong themes are the theatrical world.
And I don't know what you call the red light areas. Love hotels, prostitution.
They seem to be themes, at least that catch my eye as I'm wandering through.
Are these things that Japanese artists have themselves been obsessed with?
Or are these things that you thought, as I say before, counteract our notion of Tokyo is kind of neat and socially decorous.
LF: I think both and well.
But then also there is, of course, a bit of a cliche of Tokyo as being the kind of crazy, you know, city and crazy subculture city.
So we tried to be careful not to focus on that too much because Japan often has been kind of depicted as very, very sexual in a way.
And we didn't want to overdo that. But at the same time, we did want to hide it because it is an important part of the photography world.
For example, you know, the kind of more erotic photography and then the shunpon in terms of the erotic books that pornographic books,
that's an important part of woodblock printing culture. So, yeah, it was important to us to show it, but it was not easy, we were always kind of thinking,
how much do we show it and how can we make sure it's not kind of, you know, it doesn't become too cliché again?
But yeah, it's interesting.
That you say, you know, I would have thought that you might actually have associated that with Tokyo or with Japanese culture because some people do.
So it's actually interesting that you say, you know, your image of it is kind of more neat and you didn't really expect that side.
GB: Well, I'm very aware and I was very aware in the short time that I was there, of the importance of social decorum.
And when I came to the exhibition, I was very aware of the lack of it.
You know, teenage chases rats around the street and mock weddings.
And, you know, it was seemed to be very not decorum. A lot of the time.
LF: But I guess the Japanese,
The Japanese art world has often been a bit kind of counter, and I think in Japan also particularly at least in the 20th century,
the the art scene has, or the art world has been an opportunity to for people to kind of escape that kind of, you know,
kind of really rigid kind of socially you know, kind of categorised and fixed system.
If you are an artist, you have a lot more freedom. You can do whatever you want, if it's in that context.
GB: Yeah, we've got about 15 minutes to go.
So if any of our listeners have questions for Lena, please feel free to put them in the chat and I'll be happy to ask her them.
So you might start writing those out now while I ask for a couple of other questions.
I'm interested in the role of the catalogue in this exhibition Lena, because it seems to extend sort of beyond -
Speaking of Tokyo and constant shaking - the catalogue seems to extend
beyond the boundaries of the exhibition in a number of kind of interesting ways,
and it has a range of authors not just you and Claire, but a number of other voices.
Could you tell us how you two conceived the catalogue and how you see it in relation to the exhibition?
LF: Well, I guess one reason to to kind of put all these different kind of themes into the catalogue
that we couldn't put into the exhibition was just the space of the exhibition. Tokyo.
It's just such a massive, massive city and there's so many interesting works of art and culturally, it's just such a vibrant place.
You know, do justice to that and three Rooms.
So we thought, okay, the book is an opportunity to do to go beyond the space that we have in the museum.
And then I think one reason is also, I just really like nice books.
So, you know I was I quite like coming up with these beautiful books, that kind of- books last.
You can look at them years later after the exhibition.
And so Claire and I both really wanted to to create a book that doesn't look like a classic exhibition catalogue, where you know,
you have the work lists and then a kind of entry, maybe about each individual work beside that. We actually use quite a lot at the at the Ashmolean.
And I mean, thank God that we chose this, this kind of free approach because, you know, with the changes in the work list due to COVID,
it would have been much more difficult to do an exhibition catalogue that's really based on the works in the exhibition.
Whereas this way doesn't really matter there are, you know, works in the in the book that in the end,
we couldn't show in the exhibition, but you know, it doesn't matter.
And yeah again, it's kind of the whole idea of a kind of meaningful coffee table book that I mentioned before for my 'Ravens and red lipstick' book.
I think that can be found in this one as well.
Certainly with the pink edges that we chose, you know. GB: I was going to ask about that, I overheard you saying that you pushed for that.
Why would you think that was an important element - the pink edges? LF: Oh, well, the pink edges represent kind of good design, I guess.
So just pushing for a good design because of course, there are kind of museum standards and kind of certain kind of guidelines,
and you have to fit into a certain template, which is not always easy for me.
When people tell me what to do, I kind of get it bit, you know, I want to do something different just by nature.
But so we work closely with a really, really good designer, Sarah Boris, who also designed my 'Ravens and red lipstick' book.
And she came up with this idea of doing something really funky and kind of neon colours.
And we thought it actually it works really well and makes the book a bit special just, you know, as an object.
GB: Now it's again struck me as a visitor to the Ashmolean that this exhibition comprised
of quite so much photography as the Ash doesn't officially collect photographs.
So how does the temporary exhibition programme correspond with the collecting policy of the museum?
LF: Well, I think it complements the collection strategy, so we try to do that we can't do in the collection,
and that wouldn't really make sense to do it in the collection at this stage. You know, just now start collecting photographs.
You know, we have so few photographs in the collection now, it doesn't really make sense,
particularly considering that the Bodleian, for example, has a strength in photography.
So, you know, we think about other museums and other collections in Oxford,
but it doesn't mean that we can't do exhibitions that feature things that we don't have in the collection.
So I think the exhibition programme is something that can complement the collection and the displays.
GB: And have you found that - because you mentioned that you collected some El-Salahi work
in conjunction with that exhibition - have things come into to the Ashmolean permanent collection as a result of this exhibition as well?
LF: Yes, so there are a few prints that Claire actually acquired already thinking about the exhibition.
So sometimes it's easier to then acquire something than borrowing it.
So there was a Namatsue. So one of the catfish prints, you know,
the catfish that was seen as a that they believed they used to think is a kind
of as a mythological figure that would cause earthquakes under the Earth.
And so something that was key for us to include in the exhibition and there was a loan that we wanted to get, but that fell through.
And then thankfully, Claire found actually a print that she could acquire.
So that's something that kind of came out of the exhibition. But yeah, there are also artists who now have offered their work.
So I can already say because this has been confirmed that the Mohri Yuko photographs
the photographs of the leaks in the underground stations.
She has offered those to our collection and we, as you said, we don't really collect.
we don't collect photographs unless they relate directly to the Ashmolean in one way or another,
and we thought actually those works quite make sense in the collection because they can also be
shown very nicely alongside some of the historic woodblock prints in like thematic displays.
And so we've decided to accept them, and that's really wonderful.
GB: And when they are collected, are they collected under the rubric of Japanese art or under modern and contemporary art.
I mean, are they in the eastern art department?
LF: Yes. So I mean, the structure of the museum is, of course, has grown.
You know, it has a historic context, so that's the Western Art Department and Eastern Art Department,
which for our contemporary works is sometimes really tricky because I mean,
I mean, for these Japanese photographs, it's a Japanese artist who's based in Japan, so you could argue it's eastern art.
But with Ibrahim El Sa Hali, You know, is he an eastern artist, is he a Western artist.
But in the end, it doesn't really matter if it's part of the collection. You know, nobody else needs to know if they sit.
in the Western Art Department collection, or the eastern art department collection,
GB: You know, internally, sometimes these things can shape collections for good or ill.
These kinds of, you know, internal divisions. So I was just interested how it actually works.
So what exhibition project are you working on next and what is next for you?
LF: So there is.
So I mentioned the Neo Expressionism collection before and I actually received that new collecting award two years ago by the art fund.
And so that gave me some money.
in order to do research and also to in order to acquire artworks and so acquired quite a few works over the last two years,
but they haven't been shown. And so there's going to be a small exhibition in Gallery eight.
So where we currently have the Dante exhibition next autumn. And so that's one project that I'm working on.
And then after that, there's also a series of exhibitions which I'm working on called 'Ashmolean Now',
in which we invite UK based mid-career artists to react to the collections as well.
So the first one is going to be two painters who have already come or actually one of them is coming next week.
Flora Yukhnovich, an artist who's very interested in kind of baroque and rococo style and who creates these large scale paintings.
But she's kind of the perfect candidate for, you know, doing something with the historic collections.
So the idea is that we show these artists works and some of the existing works,
but they always kind of make at least one work kind of in reaction to the museum.
And so that's going to be a series with different artists.
So they're all UK based, which kind of sounds a bit boring, but they try to kind of be very diverse and, you know,
kind of looking at different artistic media and different artistic backgrounds,
there are artists from different countries and who do all kinds of different works.
GB: The exhibitions will include historic objects from the collections with the contemporary work? LF: and we don't know yet.
That might be, yeah, we haven't really decided details yet,
but I think it depends on the individual artists and on the individual works, but that's certainly possible.
GB: Okay. Okay. Now I just wanted to also ask you about a short essay you recently had published in Aperture.
I was interested in it because although it wasn't the only theme, one of the themes that you touched on was,
I don't know, life in lockdown and how artists have responded to it in the kind of work that they have made.
And this artist is a photographer named Anne Hardy, another British artist.
I wonder if you might just say why you were attracted to that artist's work and when indeed,
was that the reason why you were attracted because you were looking for a contemporary art responding to the lockdown experience that we've all had?
LF: No, not really. That was not the reason I just came across her work and really liked it because it has
that kind of micro versus macro kind of level that the photographs that I should say,
they kind of look almost kind of like astronomic kind of pictures.
But actually, she spoke about imitating
dirt particles and things like that.
And so that aesthetic that she's able to create by looking at these small structures that,
you know, that was something that really fascinated me and that I thought was interesting.
GB: Do you often write outside the institutions, so to speak? It is that encouraged by the Ashmolean?
LF: Yes, it's well, it's encouraged, and at least it's OK.
You know, it's OK if it's somewhere like Aperture because they're, you know, independent.
But if it's, for example, in some national institutions, you shouldn't really write for galleries because it's saying that, you know,
you as a kind of curator of the national institution, are kind of, you know then
elevating the work if you will, which at the Ashmolean, they're not so strict about this.
I guess again, because we're part of the University. So I mean, writing in general is encouraged, whatever it is.
And I really enjoye that. And do it quite a lot.
GB: Yeah. I mean, it's not uncommon for contemporary art specialists to be, you know, scouting studios and looking at young artists work.
So do you find that takes up a certain amount of your professional life? LF: Yes, for sure.
And I think for that reasons, it's actually good that I'm that I'm based in London because, yeah, there are so many artists in the city here.
And so, you know, they're sometimes at the moment not as much.
But usually there are dinners and kind of events and gallery openings and yes, studio visits, as you say.
And yeah, I really like that part of my job, you know, just the dialogue with artists is something that I really, really enjoy.
GB: It sounds like it's been central to your practise.
GB: We've just had another interesting conversation for the past hour.
Thank you so much for joining us today and sharing your experience and knowledge.
It's kind of remarkable how you've immersed yourself in Japanese culture for quite so long.
And of course, we're all benefiting from it now.
Looking at the Tokyo exhibition, so I encourage everybody listening if they haven't already to go along and see that exhibition themselves,
and no doubt they'll have their own questions. And you can always run into Lena in the street and interrogate her about decisions,
and we'll look forward to seeing the next round of exhibitions that you'll be involved with. So.
Thanks very much. And I hope I'll see you around very soon.
Yes, thank you. Thanks for having me. Bye bye. Bye.