In numbers of eyeballs on artworks Tokyo is the unchallenged World capital of art. So, what is on offer in our World beating galleries and exhibition spaces, as Spring starts to bring its varied joys?
Here are our unbeatable art picks for the month ahead, including French Impressionism, Edo art, Zen-punk tapestries, Nihonga, and Swedish painting.
Here are our unbeatable art picks for the month ahead, including French Impressionism, Edo art, Zen-punk tapestries, Nihonga, and Swedish painting.
Claude MONET, In the Norwegian, c. 1887, Oil on canvas, Musée d’Orsay Photo © GrandPalaisRmn (musée d’Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski / distributed by AMF
MONET: QUESTIONING NATURE
Claude Monet is possibly the world's favourite artist, creating lush impressionist works that evoked nature as much as they depicted it. With 2026 marking the centenary of his death, the ARTIZON is rolling out its big guns, bringing together its own collection of 41 Monets with 90 more flown in from Paris's Musée d’Orsay. Perfect art for the start of Spring! The only thing I'm worried about is that it's going to be packed, so pick a time when it's not busy, like 3am in the morning (joke!).
Now - 24th May, 2026.
PRICE: ¥2500.
Four Sleeping Figures (detail) Homma Museum of Art, second half of the exhibition
ROSETSU NAGASAWA
If you live over on the West side of Tokyo—and even if you don't—the exhibition at the FUCHU ART MUSEUM may well be worth a visit. Nagasawa was one of the more versatile Edo period artists. He could paint cute, funny, and also more profound subjects. In this first big show of his work in 64 years, the emphasis is more on the "kawaii" side of his art, with works depicting puppies and rather cuddly tigers. Also enjoy the cherry blossoms and young leaves of Metropolitan Fuchu Forest Park where the museum is located.
March 14th to May 10th
PRICE: ¥800
STILL, Cotton, hemp, silk, wool, bandage, iron © 2026 Junko Oki
JUNKO OKI: STILL
The KOSAKU KANECHIKA GALLERY, in the still new and shiny Toda Building, is always a good place to catch a bit of free art. Their next show focuses on the work of fabric artist Junko Oki, whose large abstract "tapestries" invoke a world in which Punk and Zen are deeply involved in an incestuous love affair (you know these two things are related, right?). The exhibition will present several works, including the monster above, which spans 1.5 meters and refers to physical stillness and temporal endurance.
March 7th – 18th April
PRICE: FREE
Shimomura Kanzan, Scene from Noh Play, Yoroboshi, 1915, Tokyo National Museum, TMN Image Archives
KANZAN SHIMOMURA: LIFE, ART, & SOCIETY
Shimomura (1873-1930) is often regarded as the last great painter of the Kano school, but as a school that straddled several centuries and included scores of artists, it was more an attitude than a specific style. Its keynote was a show of effortless skill and timeless sophistication, combined with a kind of snobbish coolness. In what looks like an impressive retrospective, the NATIONAL MUSEUM of MODERN ART is bringing together 150 of his works, illustrating the trajectory of this very modern traditionalist who also spent 2 years studying in Britain.
March 17th – 10th May
PRICE: ¥2,000.
Bruno Liljefors, Jay, 1886, oil on canvas
MASTERS OF SWEDISH PAINTING
The TOKYO METROPOLITAN ART MUSEUM's "Masters of Swedish Painting" is just that, a top notch selection of Swedish painters, sourced from the Nationalmuseum Stockholm. Names like Carl Larsson and Anders Zorn may not be internationally known, but they are from the top of the tree in their own land, and, along with the atmospheric art of Eugène Jansson and the vivid nature paintings of Bruno Liljefors, highlight the Swedish project to learn from 19th century art but move in a distinctly Swedish direction, of which sensitive realism was very much a part.
Now - 12th April
PRICE: ¥2,300.
KANOKOGI Takeshiro, Portrait of a Woman (undated), Private collection
TAKESHIRO KANOKOGI
This exhibition has some things in common with the Masters of Swedish Painting exhibition (above). Again we have France as the fount of artistic knowledge, again the love of realism, and again an artist using his foreign-learned skills to express something more local. The show at the SEN-OKU HAKUKOKAN, the Tokyo branch of a famous Kyoto Museum, explores the work of Takeshiro Kanokogi (1874~1941), and is the first large-scale retrospective in around 25 years. Visiting France 3 times before 1918, Kanokogi ignored the avant-garde ferment and focused on the realism of French classical painting, evolving a style that also evoked the lightness of Japanese traditional art.
Now - 5th April
PRICE: ¥1,500.
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