Curated Japan - Turning the frown upside-down

Curator / Jeffrey Ian ROSEN
Participating Artists / Natsuyuki NAKANISHI、Ushio SHINOHARA、Kaoru ARIMA、Koji ENOKURA、COBRA、Saeka ENOKURA、Hinoka MATSUOKA、Emi MIZUKAMI、Emily WANG、Yoko DAIHARA、Billy Apple、Patrick LUNDBERG、Hojan、Pingen KUO、Alexei IZMAYLOV、Kishio SUGA
Participating Galleries / SCAI THE BATHHOUSE、ANOMALY、MISAKO & ROSEN、Tomio Koyama Gallery、Tokyo Gallery+BTAP、Fig.、XYZ Collective、Soda、4649、im labor、Lavender Opener Chair、Goya Curtain、ss space space

Curatorial Statement /
Curated by Jeffrey Ian Rosen of MISAKO & ROSEN gallery, Tokyo, Turning the Frown Upside-Down focuses on a generation of hybrid commercial / independent exhibition spaces that characterize the very particular commercial landscape that has developed within Japan post 2008.

Taking the project XYZ Collective, founded in 2011 by artists COBRA and Soshiro Matsubara and editor Madoka Hattori, as an exemplary example, and including contributions by artists represented by independent yet more standard commercial galleries such as ANOMALY and MISAKO & ROSEN, the project offers a cross-section of this global phenomenon which has arguably found its most hospitable locale within Japan.

Turning the Frown Upside-Down offers historical precedent of this independent spirit via the work of High Red Center (artist collective active from 1963-4) artist Natsuyuki Nakanishi and posits that post global financial collapse, the commercial art world has taken a sharp turn towards cultivating a hyper-commercially focused system with an emphasis on developing a market dominated by the so-called mega-gallery model.

This has left multiple generations of artists stranded and without formal gallery representation. Rather than defeat, however, what characterizes what followed is a period of self-determination and agency by two generations of artists; these artists, benefitting from newly developed and easily accessible sources of global information exchange (for example, the on-line resource Contemporary Art Library) and a greater ease of communication via social media.

The commercial turn in the art word led to a proliferation of major art fairs and with them alternatives such as NADA Miami (a fair organized by the New-York based non-profit organization, New Art Dealers Alliance) Paris Internationale (a fair established by a group of galleries in 2015) and the more modest, local exhibition based platform, Artist Running Festival, organized by COBRA in Kyoto (2021-23).

Educated on the workings of the commercial gallery system through their travels to such international fairs, artists also gained first-hand connections with their colleagues abroad and this greater mobility led to the formation of a global network and a coterie of artists knowledgeable enough to create their own related but more culturally forward gallery model.

Tokyo-based spaces such as Lavender Opener Chair (founded in 2020), doubling as a modest restaurant, Tohmei Diner, offered many of their artist friends their debut gallery exhibitions and the international success of such artists serves as a concrete example of the rapidity with which this model has gained success.

As an apex of this phenomenon and a touchpoint for reflection, the recently closed (May-June, 2026) Static of an Egg, curated by Martin Germann for David Zwirner in New York focused, in part, on artists of this generation from Japan.