Image: Museum of Art, Ehime, Matsuyama
The Museum of Art, Ehime in Matsuyama will present 'Shin! Ukiyo-e Exhibition' from 25 July to 13 September 2026, bringing together ukiyo-e from the late Edo through Meiji periods and framing them as works that responded to rapid social change. The exhibition is scheduled for the museum’s Main Building, 2nd Floor, in Permanent Exhibition Rooms 1 and 2, and admission during the run is 1,700 yen for general visitors, with reduced rates for students and advance sales.
According to the museum, the exhibition highlights “excellent works” that reflect the shifting character of ukiyo-e in the years from the end of the shogunate to the modernizing Meiji era. It places emphasis on the medium’s role as a kind of mass communication, showing how prints conveyed news of a society in upheaval while also serving as popular entertainment through images of kabuki stars and narrative scenes based on well-known fiction.
Works by major artists associated with the period are included, among them Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, Ochiai Yoshiiku and Kawanabe Kyōsai. The museum’s presentation also notes that the exhibition draws on the cooperation of the Asai Collection, a collection with 120 years of history, and focuses on how these artists responded sharply to the changes of their time with fresh visual expression.
The exhibition is organized in four chapters, beginning with a prologue featuring an immersive display. The first section, titled 'Artists who captured a “new” era', examines ukiyo-e as media, while the second looks at seasonal imagery, genre scenes and famous places. A third section is devoted to actor prints, and the final chapter covers warrior images, stories and history paintings under the theme of artists of imagination and invention. Works listed by the museum include Kuniyoshi’s 'Tōkaidō Yotsuya Kaidan: Scene of the Dream', Yoshitoshi’s 'The Subjugation of the Demon God of Ōeyama by the Four Heavenly Kings of Raikō', and Kuniyoshi’s 'Raikō’s Three Retainers Playing Go'.
The museum says digital content will accompany the display, including immersive elements designed to let visitors experience the world of ukiyo-e in a more immediate way. The exhibition pages also point to an active public programme running alongside the show, with related events including a lecture on collector Yūsuke Asai and ukiyo-e, printmaking demonstrations and hands-on workshops, a talk on ukiyo-e ghost stories, and floor lectures by curators.
Opening hours are 9:40am to 6pm, with last admission at 5:30pm, and the museum lists several closure dates during the run, including 27 July, 4 August, 10 August, 17 August, 24 August, 31 August and 8 September. The exhibition is supported by the Shin! Ukiyo-e Exhibition Ehime Executive Committee, made up of Ehime Prefecture and Ehime Shimbun, with co-operation from Ehime CATV and planning support from TOPPAN.
