New Acquisitions in 2012

For museums, the preservation and exhibition of irreplaceable cultural properties in an appropriate environment is an important task. As a national museum, the Tokyo National Museum preserves and widely displays a collection of high-quality cultural properties, which date from ancient to modern times and represent an extensive range of genres. In addition to works of Japanese origin, the collection includes objects from regions throughout Asia which also offer valuable insights into Japanese culture.

To display the collection systematically and to explore some themes in more depth, there are areas of the collection which need to be enriched. For this reason, the museum constantly strives to increase the number of exceptional cultural properties it preserves.

Last year the museum acquired 68 new items: 63 were received as donations, while the other 5 were purchased through funds from TNM Members donations as well as other sources. Each of these objects is of remarkable importance for the study of Japanese and other Asian cultures.

This exhibition features 25 of these new additions to the museum collection. We hope this exhibition will deepen understanding of this facet of the museum's work while also communicating the vitality of cultures past.