Hikaru Fujii’s “WHOSE LIGHT?” Opened at the Artizon Museum, Asking Who Shines the Light

A “Jam Session” exhibition featuring Hikaru Fujii opened at the Artizon Museum (Chuo-ku, Tokyo) on Saturday, October 24, 2026. Its full title is “Jam Session: Ishibashi Foundation Collection × Hikaru Fujii WHOSE LIGHT? – Whose Light Is It?” and it runs until Sunday, January 31, 2027. Taking as a clue “light = truth” in the “Allegory of the Cave” in Plato’s “Republic,” it asks who is shining that light. Twenty-two works from the Ishibashi Foundation Collection and more than a dozen works by Fujii, including new ones, are arranged along a timeline from antiquity to the postwar period.

Who is Hikaru Fujii, who reexamines history through cinematic methods and documentary?

Hikaru Fujii is an artist who creates works between art, history and society using installation, video, workshops and other means. Based on research and fieldwork, he has examined crises and structural violence in the present and in history.

According to the museum, Fujii is known for his video installations, works that reexamine history in his own way by interweaving a “cinematic method” of scripts and direction with “documentary” based on objective records. His major works include “Japanese War Art 1946” (2022) and “Mujo” (2019).

He has shown his work at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, M+, the Centre Pompidou-Metz and elsewhere. He has also taken part in international festivals such as the Rencontres d’Arles (2024) and received the Tokyo Contemporary Art Award 2020–2022.

The theme of the seventh Jam Session: “light = truth”

“Jam Session” is a series that explores new possibilities for art by bringing together the Ishibashi Foundation Collection and contemporary artists. It has been held every year since the museum opened in 2020. The sixth edition, in 2025, featured Chikako Yamashiro and Lieko Shiga, who have confronted history and memory from their roots in Okinawa and Tohoku. Shiga’s solo exhibition at the Aomori Museum of Art is introduced in our article on the Lieko Shiga exhibition.

For the seventh edition, Fujii focused on the theme of “light = truth” at the heart of the “Allegory of the Cave” in Book VII of Plato’s “Republic.” Rather than asking what the light illuminates, he reverses the question to ask who is shining the light. The museum describes this as an attempt to critically reexamine the very structure of truth.

From a cast of the Parthenon to Pollock and new works: what can be seen?

The exhibition begins with a replica of a relief fragment from the Parthenon in ancient Greece. It continues with glass vessels from Syria-Palestine and elsewhere and ceramics from medieval Iran. Beyond them are religious images by Dürer, from the Reformation period, and by Aldegrever, who was influenced by him. From the wartime to the postwar period come works by Hanjiro Sakamoto, Jackson Pollock and Alberto Giacometti.

Dürer is represented by “Holy Family with Three Hares” (1498) and Sakamoto by “Three Brave Human Bombs” (1935). Pollock’s “Number 2, 1951” (1951) and Giacometti’s “Bust of Diego” (1954–55) are also on display. Fujii’s works include the following previously shown pieces and new works.

• “The First Fact” (2018): a work inspired by an incident in ancient Greece regarded as the origin of democracy

• “Nanban Pictures” (2017): brings to light the contact between East and West in the medieval period and the context of colonialism and slavery spreading to the south

• “Mujo” (2019): a video installation in which young people living in Japan as immigrants reenact the education given in Taiwan under Japanese rule

• “Spare the Submissive and Strike Down the Proud” (2026): an installation composed of glass vessels and medieval Iranian ceramics from the Ishibashi Foundation’s collection

One of the new works continues “Japanese War Art 1946,” which he presented in 2022 on receiving the TCAA. Its subject is archival material on Japanese war record paintings compiled by a U.S. military intelligence agency and newly discovered by a historian. Fujii photographed the material at the U.S. National Archives and builds the work around these documentary photographs.

The two new works placed at the end of the exhibition deal with the discourses on the peaceful and military uses of nuclear power that took shape from the postwar period through the Cold War. They also reexamine the religious discourses deeply intertwined with them.

The concurrent “Étrangers” exhibition is included in the same ticket

In the 5th- and 4th-floor galleries, “Étrangers: Japanese Western-Style Painters’ Experiences in Europe” runs for the same period. It presents more than 100 works from the Ishibashi Foundation Collection made in Europe by Japanese artists who traveled there after the Meiji Restoration, including Fujishima Takeji’s “Black Fan” (1908–09), an Important Cultural Property, and Yuzo Saeki’s “Advertisements on the Terrace” (1927). It is introduced in detail in our article on the “Étrangers” exhibition.

Tickets, prices and access, with free admission for students who reserve

The Artizon Museum uses a timed-entry reservation system. For adults, web reservation tickets cost 1,200 yen and tickets sold at the window cost 1,500 yen, and they cover all concurrent exhibitions. University, vocational school and high school students are admitted free but must reserve online and show a student ID upon entry.

Web reservation tickets are limited for each entry time slot and are sold until 10 minutes before the end of each slot. Tickets can be bought at the window if there is space, but the museum urges visitors to buy before coming.

Related programs are held in the 3rd-floor Lecture Room from 14:00 to 15:30 (80 people, advance application, first come, first served). An artist talk takes place on Saturday, October 24, and a dialogue with Robert Campbell (director of the Sendai Mediatheque) on Saturday, November 7. On Saturday, January 9, 2027, Asako Masubuchi (associate professor, Ritsumeikan University) will speak, with Fujii as interviewer.

The museum is located at 1-7-2 Kyobashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, a 5-minute walk from JR Tokyo Station (Yaesu Central Exit), Kyobashi Station on the Tokyo Metro Ginza Line (Exits 6 and 7) and Nihombashi Station (Exit B1). Contemporary art exhibitions are compiled in our [2026–2027] Guide to Contemporary Art Exhibitions.

Overview

Name: Jam Session: Ishibashi Foundation Collection × Hikaru Fujii WHOSE LIGHT? – Whose Light Is It?
Dates: Saturday, October 24, 2026 – Sunday, January 31, 2027
Hours: 10:00–18:00 (until 20:00 every Friday; last entry 30 minutes before closing)
Closed: Mondays (open on November 23 and January 11), November 24, December 28 – January 4, January 12
Venue: Artizon Museum, 6th-floor gallery
Address: 1-7-2 Kyobashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo
Admission: Adults: web reservation ticket 1,200 yen, window ticket 1,500 yen. Free for university, vocational school and high school students (web reservation required). Free for junior high school students and younger, and for holders of a disability certificate and one companion (no reservation required)
Organizer: Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation
Official website: https://www.artizon.museum/exhibition/detail/608
*Information as of October 19, 2026. Please check the official website for the latest information.

*Top image: Museum Tower Kyobashi, home of the Artizon Museum, December 2019 (photo: Wpcpey, CC BY 4.0, from Wikimedia Commons)

*This article was compiled by the TOKYO ART SPHERE editorial team based on press releases from the Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation (September 24, 2026, and others) and information on its official website.

Text: TOKYO ART SPHERE Editorial Team