The Spark
I was poking around on Instagram killing time as one does when one has better things to do when, among the usual timeline of kimono, fitness recipes, art, and cute animals, an interesting advertisement featuring some nifty art deco piece popped up along with 「大正・昭和」, Taisho and Showa, in big letters. Mind, I’m a sucker for retro design, especially Taisho era and early Showa era Art Deco. Specifically, the exhibit was “The Source of Taisho and Showa Mode,” “mode” meaning style of fashion.
Then I noticed that it was being held in Gifu. At the Museum of Fine Arts Gifu, specifically. I didn’t even know we had a prefectural fine art museum.
I had to go.
The Outfit
If we’re going to an art museum, of course I had to make it a kimono outing.
It almost wasn’t, however. When the exhibit started, I was locked in on getting my last two IVF embryo transfers done. The meds made me feel like absolute garbage and even if I wanted to do kitsuke, kimono dressing, I just didn’t have the energy.
Unfortunately, the last attempt failed in early February, so I did get to go in kimono. I needed a lot of these kinds of small things to cheer up.
Shockingly, I don’t own any Taisho kimono, but I do have a lot of retro Showa kimono, so I leaned into that style.
I chose a very 60’s-70’s vibe casual kasuri kimono. Kasuri kimono are made by dying the threads before weaving the fabric, resulting in the patterns having a wispy look to them. I usually dress up a little more for a museum, but I still didn’t have a lot of energy. The obi was a disaster and I covered it up with a haori.
The Visit
The Museum of Fine Arts Gifu is near the Prefectural Government Office and right across the street from the Gifu Prefectural Library.
The parking situation was a little confusing, but we got there alright. Parking is free.
The museum is much bigger than I was expecting. Dude and I got our tickets, which also included the special graphic design exhibit and the current items on the display in the regular collection hall in addition to the Taisho and Showa Mode one.
The exhibit was fantastic, starting with examples of Art Nouveau, and did a fine job of showing the shift away from natural shapes to the more rigid Art Deco style, then on how new materials and production led to the change of focus from the rich to the average person in the Showa era.
Unfortunately, photography was not allowed inside the museum.
We visited the graphic design exhibit, which was also beautiful, but the room was extremely hot. I would’ve liked to spend more time there, but we just couldn’t.
Last of all was the regular collection. I thought the preliminary sketches for Yoro Park, also in Gifu, were especially interesting!
After our Visit
Of course we ate!
We got a sugar fix at Hoshino Coffee; the heat in the graphic design exhibit really wore us out. I got some delicious fluffy pancakes.
After that, we had a proper ramen dinner at Raaichi! It’s one of our favorite ramen joints in Gifu City.