Museum of the Imperial Collections opens in full, showing Shōsōin treasures inside the Imperial Palace for the first time
Key points
- The Museum of the Imperial Collections, inside Tokyo's Imperial Palace grounds, opened in full on 3 November.
- The first rotation of its opening exhibition shows Shōsōin treasures inside the palace grounds for the first time.
- All 30 scrolls of Itō Jakuchū's Colorful Realm of Living Beings go on view together from February 2027.
The Museum of the Imperial Collections, Sannomaru Shozokan, which holds art handed down in Japan's Imperial Family, opened in full on 3 November. It is the first time every gallery in the building has been open.
The opening exhibition runs until 24 January 2027. Its first rotation shows treasures from the Shōsōin that are associated with Emperor Shōmu, inside the Imperial Palace grounds for the first time.
The Shōsōin is a treasure house at Tōdai-ji temple in Nara. Its origin dates to 756, when Empress Kōmyō donated objects to the temple's Great Buddha. The collection is not open to the public, and only a selection is shown each autumn at the Nara National Museum. Seeing these objects in central Tokyo is new.
From February 2027 the museum will show all 30 hanging scrolls of Itō Jakuchū's Colorful Realm of Living Beings together. Jakuchū worked in Kyoto in the 18th century and painted the set between about 1757 and 1765.
Details
- Full opening
- 3 November 2026
- Opening exhibition
- 3 November 2026 – 24 January 2027
- Where
- Museum of the Imperial Collections, Sannomaru Shozokan (Imperial Palace East Gardens, Tokyo)
- Next
- Jakuchū's Colorful Realm of Living Beings, from February 2027
Japan, in a word
- 正倉院 Shōsōin
- A treasure house at Tōdai-ji temple in Nara. It preserves objects connected to the 8th-century Emperor Shōmu and Empress Kōmyō. The collection is closed to the public, with a selection shown in Nara each autumn.
- 動植綵絵 Dōshoku sai-e
- "Colorful Realm of Living Beings": a set of 30 hanging scrolls of birds, fish and flowers that Itō Jakuchū painted between about 1757 and 1765. It is a National Treasure.
Itō Jakuchū, Rooster and Hen with Hydrangeas, from Colorful Realm of Living Beings (reference image). Wikimedia Commons / Public domain
