Gerhard Richter Exhibition (Japan) 2022

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Gerhard Richter Exhibition (Japan) 2022

[Richter and the Reflective World] (Review topic)

My impressions after viewing Gerhard Richter’s solo exhibition, Gerhard Richter, held in 2022 in Tokyo and Toyota, Japan.

Table of contents

Overview

  • Exhibition title: “Gerhard Richter Exhibition”
  • Tokyo Exhibition
    • The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
    • Tuesday, June 7, 2022 – Sunday, October 2, 2022
  • Toyota City Exhibition
    • Toyota Municipal Museum of Art
    • Saturday, October 15, 2022 – Sunday, January 29, 2023

The works on display come from the Gerhard Richter Foundation, Wako Works of Art, the artist’s collection, and private collections.

The exhibition toured two venues: the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo and the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.

Photography was allowed inside the venue, except for two works: “Birkenau (photo version)” (68 [CR 937E]) and “Film: Volker Bradke” (1966 16mm black and white film, 14 minutes 32 seconds, private collection).

At the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art exhibition, “Mood” from the artist’s collection, was on special display.

Review [Richter and the Reflective World]

I have only seen Richter’s work at a small exhibition at Wako Works of Art and at a contemporary art exhibition, so this was my first opportunity to see many of his works at once.

Richter has created works in a variety of styles throughout the years, and this time I focused on the “reflection” of his works using glass and mirrors and summarized my impressions.

Mirror reflection has long been a philosophical theme, and many people have left their thoughts on the principle of how images are inverted by mirrors and the world reflected there.

As of 2025, there is a convincing explanation of the principle, but there are still some things that are not quite clear, and the phenomenon of mirror reflection is an interesting world. In the first place, senses, including vision, vary greatly from person to person, so it may be impossible to make the phenomenon of mirror reflection clear to everyone.

Also, when taking a photo, the distance from the subject is always one of the important factors, but it is very interesting that when photographing an image in a mirror, the focus position is always at infinity. A world where depth has disappeared, where both close and long distances are compressed.

Enough with the digression, let’s move on to my impressions.

“8 Glasses”

What is reflected in the extraordinary reflected by eight pieces of glass at different angles? It is very fun to see a completely different world appear depending on the viewing angle.

The works placed around this work are different at the Tokyo and Toyota venues, with “4900 Colors” and “Strip” at the Toyota venue and “Abstract Painting” at the Tokyo venue. I imagine the difference in scenery caused by the difference in the situation, such as the works reflected at both venues and the number of visitors, and I wish I had seen both.

“Mirror”,”Mirror, Gray”,”Mirror, Blood Red”,”Anterio Glass”

These four reflective works exhibited in the first corridor are different colors, completely reflective, gray, red, and semi-transparent, and reflect the viewer and the surroundings in the works. Richter’s reflective works are simple and there is nothing particularly noteworthy about the works themselves. However, when you stand a little away from the work and look at the moving viewers reflected in the mirror, various people overlap but are depicted flatly, ignoring the context. The scene feels like a world on a different time axis from the real world where you feel depth.

“Gray Mirror”

“Gray Mirror” is the largest reflective work in this exhibition. It sucks in the surrounding Birkenau and the many viewers, trapping them on the same surface.
The inverted world seen through this large work emphasizes the flatness of the space and the world reflected in the mirror has the appearance of another world that is detached from reality.
It is like a parallel world, and makes you realize the various possibilities when time differentiates and the uncertainty of the existence of the present.

“Skull”

Although “Skull” is not a work that contains a mirror, the acrylic panel that covers the work is a mirror. Usually, people dislike the reflection in the acrylic panel when viewing a work of art, but when you see the surrounding space being unintentionally reflected in this way, the reflection feels like part of the work.

Outdoors

On the day, the ground was covered with a ☔️ pattern, and the wet ground acted as a mirror, reflecting the people and buildings passing by, which motivated me to think of this exhibition as a reflection.

“Click on the image to enlarge”

Summary

The exhibition was very voluminous, with a total of 139 pieces, and the first floor was full of variety, so I spent a lot of time appreciating the exhibits. The rooms with “8 Glasses” and “Gray Mirror” were particularly interesting.

However, perhaps because I was tired from the exhibition, I was rather careless in appreciating the many pieces in the “Abstract Paintings” and “Dates” series on the second and third floors. I might have been able to appreciate the differences between the works more if I had followed the differences between them.

As mentioned above, Richter creates works in a variety of styles throughout each era, and is not an artist who only uses “mirrors (reflections)”. However, when I viewed this exhibition, I was very impressed by how the works are always made aware of the viewer by interweaving mirrors in them.

I arrived just after the museum opened, so it wasn’t very crowded, and when I returned to the exhibition room after lunch, there were quite a few people, so it was a good choice to arrive early and start appreciating. From past experience, local venues often get crowded after noon. Also, since this exhibition allowed us to return to the exhibition hall after leaving, we were able to take our time appreciating it from 10am until around 2pm.

Some exhibitions do not allow you to leave midway through, so if you start viewing at 10 or 11am, it can be tricky to get lunch time, so exhibitions that allow re-entry on the same day are very appreciated.

Side talk

I skipped the Tokyo venue for the “Gerhard Richter Exhibition” because it looked like it would be crowded, and instead went to the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art as part of my trip. Unfortunately, it was raining on the day I went, but because I had rented a car, I left Kanagawa Prefecture at 5am and took the Shin-Tomei Expressway, arriving at the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art a little after it opened at 10am.

(The Toyota Municipal Museum of Art is about 300km away from where I live.)

I had breakfast at the Shimizu Service Area on the way, and had lunch at the restaurant Le Musee (Miyuse) at the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.

On the way back, because there was a high possibility of traffic congestion on the highway, I left Toyota City at 3pm, and arrived in Kanagawa Prefecture after 7pm. For dinner, I ate a bento box I bought on the way home.

This time, I drove about 600km round trip in a rented Toyota Aqua. Since it can run more than 25km per liter, it can run about 700km on a full tank, so I thought I could easily make the round trip to Toyota City if I didn’t make any detours on the way, but the fuel tank was a little lower than the full tank when I rented it. On the way back, the fuel warning light came on, so I filled up with 5 liters of fuel at a service area on the highway, which would run about 100km. Gasoline is relatively cheap in Toyota City, so if I had filled up at my destination and then returned home, I would have been able to return home more safely.

Reference links

Update history

  • 2025.6.13

Photo equipment

  • HASSELBLAD X2D-100C +HASSELBLAD HCD 24mm +XH-Adapter

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