An exhibition of works by the Lithuanian painter-composer Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis will be held in Tokyo in 2026 under a letter of intent signed in Kaunas by the heads of the Čiurlionis National Museum of Art and Japan’s National Museum of Western Art.
The exhibition is planned for the spring of 2026, Lithuania’s Culture Ministry said on Friday.
The Japanese delegation has toured the collections of the Čiurlionis National Museum of Art, learned about its exhibitions abroad, and also watched a VR film based on Čiurlionis’ work, The Trail of Angels.
Opened in 1959, the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo is the most important state museum in Japan and the only one in Asia dedicated to Western art, the ministry said.
The planned exhibition will be the second exhibition of Čiurlionis’ works in Japan. The first exhibition was held at Tokyo’s Sezon Museum of Modern Art in 1992. It. featured 165 works and was visited by more than 35,000 people.
Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (Polish: Mikołaj Konstanty Czurlanis, 1875–1911) was a Lithuanian composer, painter, choirmaster, cultural figure, and writer in Polish.
Čiurlionis contributed to symbolism and art nouveau, and was representative of the fin de siècle epoch. During his short life, he composed about 400 pieces of music and created about 300 paintings, as well as many literary works and poems. The majority of his paintings are housed in the Čiurlionis National Museum of Art in Kaunas, Lithuania. His works have had a profound influence on modern Lithuanian culture.
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