Six spectacular kimonos belonging to the kabuki actor Bandō Tamasaburō V will be on display in the Textiles Gallery for a year. Tamasaburō is the most popular and celebrated onnagata (male actor who performs female roles) currently on stage.The costumes selected reflect the wide variety of roles in this actor’s long and celebrated theatre career, […]

Under Construction, a solo exhibition by Geumhyung Jeong (b. 1980, Seoul) features a newly commissioned installation of sculpture and video, and series of live performances. Working from her background in choreography and a studied interest in the role of objects and technology in our lives, Jeong uses her body and animatronic figures built from DIY […]

26th September 2024 to 23rd February 2025  This continent-spanning exposition unravels how the journey of people, objects and ideas formed an expansive web of trade routes that shaped cultures and histories. Working with 29 national and international partners to present objects from many regions and cultures alongside those from the British Museum, the exhibition offers a unique chance […]

This exhibition provides a rare glimpse into the ordinary lives of people long ago through the remarkable contents of the ‘Library Cave,’ part of the Buddhist cave complex of Mogao, where a wealth of manuscripts, documents and artworks remained sealed for nearly 900 years. Detailing life in and around Dunhuang during the first millennium CE, […]

Drawing on the objects and photographs of the main donors to the Korean collection at the Oriental Museum, Knitted Together details Richard and Joan Rutt’s 20 years living in South Korea in the immediate aftermath of the Korean War (1950 – 1953). Coinciding with the 70th anniversary of when Richard first arrived in Korea as […]

Dreams, Desire & Daoism:Jizi and pioneers of contemporary ink from ChinaCo-curated by Chunchen Wang and Katie Hill An undulating cosmic scene sweeps across a horizontal plane, swirling clouds, an immersive vortex of movement leading into a central sphere.  Lit up at intervals, the whole vision is one of light and darkness, floating perspectives of constant […]