Sex and Sensitivities: Exhibiting and Interpreting Shunga at the British Museum

Abstract

• Sexually explicit paintings, prints, and illustrated books known as shunga (“spring pictures”) were produced in Japan in considerable quantities between 1600 and 1900. For most of the twentieth century, although shunga was actively collected and represented in major museum collections, it was rarely exhibited publicly, particularly the more explicit works. This has changed over the last decade, which has seen a number of large or high profile exhibitions. The British Museum’s 2013–14 exhibition, Shunga: Sex and Pleasure in Japanese Art, was the first major UK show devoted to this genre. This reflects substantial attitudinal changes to the display of sexually explicit work, both institutionally and in society at large. The British Museum exhibition, curated by Timothy Clark, Andrew Gerstle, Aki Ishigami, and Akiko Yano, was one of several significant outcomes of a five-year collaborative research project aimed at furthering understanding of shunga. Exhibiting shunga in a balanced and representative manner posed numerous challenges. This chapter explores some of these issues by drawing on evaluations commissioned by the author to inform the development of the exhibition and to measure its public impact.