Building a Bridge Between Two Cultures
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

Starting in January, the Japan Society will celebrate its 100th anniversary with a season of events that showcase the range of Japanese culture and the many forms that inter-cultural artistic dialogue can take.
In addition to a speakers series with Japanese and American business leaders and policymakers, a film festival, educational events, and two major exhibits in the Society’s gallery, the Society’s performing arts department will present a packed series of performances by Japanese and non-Japanese artists.
A hundred years are, of course, a major milestone for a cultural institution. Anne d’Harnoncourt, the director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and a member of the Japan Society’s board, said that the last century has seen many artistic influences passed back and forth between Japan and America. She cited as examples the influence of Zen Buddhism on American artists like John Cage, and the importance of artists like Isamu Noguchi, who inhabited both the Japanese and the American art worlds.
The anniversary performing arts season will open in February with a commission from the American company Big Dance Theater, called “The Other Here,” based on the short fiction of Masuji Ibuse. (The Society has an endowment, set up with a grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, to commission works from non-Japanese artists.) The Society’s artistic director, Yoko Shioya, said that she chose Big Dance Theater in part because of a piece the company did in 2001, “Shunkin,”based on a novel by Junichiro Tanizaki. “They demonstrated in ‘Shunkin’ a very free interpretation of another culture,” Ms. Shioya said in an interview. “It was unique and creative and courageous. And it was very intellectual, which I really like.”
Before awarding the commission, Ms. Shioya talked with Big Dance Theater’s leaders, the husband-and-wife team Annie-B Parson and Paul Lazar, about possible Japanese sources. She recommended that Mr. Lazar read some short works by Ibuse, who is one of her favorite authors, but whose work, she acknowledged, is often vague, nonlinear, and difficult to interpret.
When Mr. Lazar first read Ibuse’s story,”Carp,” he called Ms. Shioya and told her that he didn’t understand it at all.”But then, about two weeks later, he called me and said, ‘Yoko, since you so recommended it, I read it over and over, and then all of a sudden it came to me.'” They talked about it and found that their interpretations of the story –– which is about a man whose friend gives him a carp, then dies –– were very similar. “I had a conversation with some of my staff members, asking if it was too selfish to award a commission just because I share these feelings about the novel,” Ms. Shioya said. She decided not.
Big Dance Theater traveled to Japan to visit Ibuse’s house and speak to his nephew. They also went to Okinawa, because Ms. Parson has a longtime interest in Okinawan pop music. “We are very much involved in the creative process, rather than just giving the financial help and presenting the art to the public,” Ms. Shioya said.
“The Other Here” is based on two short novels by Ibuse, with influences from Okinawan music and traditional dance, and set –– if this can be imagined –– in the very American world of life insurance salesmen.
The rest of the season includes a work by a contemporary interpreter of noh plays, Takeshi Kawamura; a French production of Benjamin Britten’s opera “Curlew River,” based on a classic noh play; readings and workshop productions of modern noh plays created in the 1960’s by the playwright and novelist Yukio Mishima; and “Noh and Kyogen in the Park” –– a summer series of productions in the classic “bonfire noh” style.
Ms. Shioya said her goal in designing the Japan Society’s programs is to appeal both to people who are interested in classical Japanese culture, like noh drama, and to people who are interested in Japanese popular culture and subcultures, like manga, anime, and what she called “geek culture.” Ms. Shioya said that she hopes that audiences interested in classical Japanese forms will also come to see the edgier programs, and vice versa, to deepen their understanding of Japan.
The Japan Society is “an institution that over the years has quietly and steadily done a remarkable amount to connect our cultures,” Ms. d’Harnoncourt said. “They create forums for business people, intellectuals, and civic leaders to get together, and for artists to discover each other’s work. It may seem like a modest institution in scale, but it has had a profound reach and effect.”