*Available early-November 2026. Pre-order now.

We are pleased to announce the publication of the catalogue for the exhibition Reflections in Jewellery: Memory and Identity, which opens at the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, and touring afterwards to Shimane and Yamanashi Prefectures. The exhibition traces how jewellery was accepted and became widespread in Japan through its engagement with the West, and how artists have expanded the range of their expression in each era. 

It was 1964, in an era when jewellery was not yet mainstream in Japan, that Hiramatsu Yasuki (1926–2012), Hishida Yasuhiko (1927–1981) and others established the Japan Jewellery Designers Association (JJDA). The ‘International Jewellery Arts Exhibition’ (held at the Seibu Department Store in Shibuya from 1970 to 1986), organised primarily by the JJDA, introduced Western trends to Japan and helped to disseminate the concept of design as a value distinct from that of materials alone. In the late 1970s, Japan was introduced to jewellery which engaged conceptually with the distinctive characteristics of the medium and echoed contemporary art. Known as ‘contemporary jewellery’, this work offered expressions that subverted the traditional roles of wealth and symbolic status, as well as the relationship between the wearer and the viewer. Exchanges with conceptually oriented international artists continued throughout this period; in 1993, for instance, a joint exhibition known as the ‘Three School Project’, involving Tokyo, Munich, and Amsterdam, was inaugurated, with Itoh Kazuhiro (1948–1997) and Otto Künzli (b. 1948) at its centre. Today, Japanese artists have a significant presence in the field of jewellery as a form of artistic expression. At the same time, they have used conceptual jewellery as a framework through which to re-examine their own identities.

The current show, which includes a large-scale public presentation of the HIKO MIZUNO COLLEGE OF JEWELRY collection and masterworks brought to Japan from Germany after a 50-year absence, presents a total of approximately 350 pieces by post-war jewellery artists. The exhibition adopts a specifically Japanese perspective to examine the potential of jewellery as a form of artistic expression that has penetrated the wearable space.

The exhibition catalogue adopts a compact format resembling a piece of jewellery, and small works of jewellery unfold across its 700 pages. Columns and artwork descriptions are interspersed throughout to unravel the historical backgrounds and concepts behind the jewellery, and the book also includes a rich compilation of materials including essays.

Artists
Sigurd Persson, Mario Pinton, Reinhold Reiling, Bruno Martinazzi, Hiramatsu Yasuki, Hishida Yasuhiko, Herman Jünger, Yamada Reiko, Peter Skubic, Wendy Ramshaw, David Watkins, Gijis Bakker, Nakayama Aya, Bernhard Schobinger, Nagai Erico, Itoh Kazuhiro, Otto Künzli, Therese Hilbert, Caroline Broadhead, Daniel Kruger, Warwick Freeman, Sonobe Etsuko, Ted Noten, Karl Fritsch, Ishikawa Mari, Minewaki Mikiko, Felieke van der Least, Oyama Yuka, Taguchi Fumiki, Kamata Jiro, Juzu Kaori, Shinzato Akiko, and more than 70 other artists

Exhibition

Reflections in Jewellery: Memory and Identity

Oct 24, 2026-Jun 7, 2027

The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto

Mar 20-Jun 14, 2027

Iwami Art Museum, Shimane

Jul 3-Aug 29, 2027

Yamanashi Prefectural Museum of Art

Size: 105 × 150 mm / Paperback, with slipcase / 736P
Text: Tomomi Miyagawa, Miki Nammoku, Himeka Otani, Kana Shimohigashi
Languages: Japanese / English
Price: 3,500 yen
Publisher: torch press
ISBN: 978-4-907562-71-7
Year: 2026