Image: Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Tokyo. Exhibition key visual for ‘MOT Collection: Past Light, Present Sight’, showing Kimio Tsuchiya, Absence, 1992 (photo: Toshiyuki Udagawa); Mami Kosemura, Flowering Plants of the Four Seasons, 2004–06; and Shigeo Toya, Death of the Kiln of the Elephant of the Woods, 1989 (photo: Tadasu Yamamoto).
The Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo will present ‘MOT Collection: Past Light, Present Sight’ from September 19, 2026, through January 6, 2027. The exhibition will draw on the museum’s collection of approximately 6,100 works, which focuses principally on postwar art, and will include newly acquired pieces alongside works previously held by the institution.
The exhibition is organized around the connected themes of light and time. Its premise encompasses forms of illumination ranging from starlight emitted thousands of years ago and changing sunlight to moonlight, electric light and the brief glow of fireflies. The museum describes looking at such light—whether understood as seeing, observing or contemplating—as a way of recalling scenes from another time and considering how the present contains accumulated layers of the past.
Works by Mami Kosemura, Kimio Tsuchiya, Arisa Kumagai and Shigeo Toya are among those cited in the exhibition description. The presentation will consider how memories and historical traces remain embedded in the present through artworks that engage with light, duration and the passage of time. The museum gives the exhibition’s English title as ‘MOT Collection: Past Light, Present Sight’.
The listed artists include Yayoi Kusama, Arisa Kumagai, Mami Kosemura, Ushio Shinohara, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Naoko Sekine, Koichi Tateishi, Kimio Tsuchiya, Shigeo Toya, Hiroshi Nakamura, Hideko Fukushima, Hikaru Fujii, Yoko Matsumoto, Katsuhiro Yamaguchi, Tadanori Yokoo, Hiroshi Yoshida, Masunobu Yoshimura, Dan Flavin and Agnes Martin, among others. The published examples include Kimio Tsuchiya’s ‘Absence’ (1992), Mami Kosemura’s ‘Flowering Plants of the Four Seasons’ (2004–06), Shigeo Toya’s ‘Death of the Kiln of the Elephant of the Woods’ (1989), Arisa Kumagai’s ‘Say yes to me’ (2023), Yoko Matsumoto’s ‘Regarding Living Beings’ (2010), Ushio Shinohara’s ‘Oiran’ (1968) and Tadanori Yokoo’s ‘Destiny’ (1997).
‘MOT Collection: Past Light, Present Sight’ will be held at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo in Koto, Tokyo. Galleries will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., with final admission 30 minutes before closing. On Fridays in November, the museum will remain open until 8 p.m. The museum is closed on Mondays, September 24, October 13, November 24, and from December 28 through January 1, while remaining open on September 21, October 12 and November 23.
Admission is ¥500 for general visitors, ¥400 for university and vocational-school students, and ¥250 for high-school students and visitors aged 65 or older. Admission is free for children of middle-school age and younger, subject to the museum’s stated accompanying-adult requirement for elementary-school children and younger. The museum will also offer a free-student period for middle- and high-school, vocational-school and university students from October 10 through October 12, 2026.
