A small but well selected collection - though when I visited, some of the galleries were closed because they were setting up for a new exhibition.
There were probably about 25 or 30 pieces in the first display, 'Western Paintings' - entirely Europeans working from about the 1870s through to the early 20th century, and with the emphasis on the different ways that colour was being worked with and rethought during that period - which included a luxurious eight or nine by Monet (my favourites: "Water Lily Pond", 1899 - I've seen at least one other of that series before; "La Promenade", 1875; "Sunset at Etretat", 1885)), and the rest comprised of Renoir (who has struck me in now about three different museums during the last fortnight in a way that he never has before - here, e.g., "Anemones", 1883-90 and "Girl in a Lace Hat", 1891, and a couple of stunning undated landscapes), Cezanne, Van Gogh, Bonnard, Matisse, Odilon Redon, Raoul Dufy, and one each by Degas, Vuillard and Pissarro ... not much to quibble with there!
Plus a few western-style paintings by Japanese artists over the same period (Meiji, 1868-1912; Taisho, 1912-1926; Showa, 1926-1989), of which I was struck by Sekine Shoji's "Three Heads" (1919), Fujishima Takeji's "Profile of a Woman" (1926-7) and Maeta Kanji's "Nude Seen from the Back" (1927). Also, the startlingly modern (as in contemporary) "The Fields", Kuroda Seiki (1907).
There were probably about 25 or 30 pieces in the first display, 'Western Paintings' - entirely Europeans working from about the 1870s through to the early 20th century, and with the emphasis on the different ways that colour was being worked with and rethought during that period - which included a luxurious eight or nine by Monet (my favourites: "Water Lily Pond", 1899 - I've seen at least one other of that series before; "La Promenade", 1875; "Sunset at Etretat", 1885)), and the rest comprised of Renoir (who has struck me in now about three different museums during the last fortnight in a way that he never has before - here, e.g., "Anemones", 1883-90 and "Girl in a Lace Hat", 1891, and a couple of stunning undated landscapes), Cezanne, Van Gogh, Bonnard, Matisse, Odilon Redon, Raoul Dufy, and one each by Degas, Vuillard and Pissarro ... not much to quibble with there!
Plus a few western-style paintings by Japanese artists over the same period (Meiji, 1868-1912; Taisho, 1912-1926; Showa, 1926-1989), of which I was struck by Sekine Shoji's "Three Heads" (1919), Fujishima Takeji's "Profile of a Woman" (1926-7) and Maeta Kanji's "Nude Seen from the Back" (1927). Also, the startlingly modern (as in contemporary) "The Fields", Kuroda Seiki (1907).
And a display of glassworks, mostly by the Daum Brothers. The ones with the landscapes were especially beautiful.
