A Feast For the Eyes

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Friday, February 1, 2008

The exclamation point in the title of the "Japan!" festival is hardly accidental. Other artists whose flirtation with excess rivals Yayoi Kusama's include Mika Ninagawa.

The daughter of theater director Yukio Ninagawa (whose acclaimed staging of "Shintoku-Maru" plays in the Opera House on Thursday through Feb. 9), the 35-year-old photographer will be represented in the festival by "Everlasting Flowers," an exhibition of floral still lifes in the Grand Foyer. Did I stay still lifes? Her color-saturated portraits of posies have such retina-searing intensity, they seem on fire.

Some of Japan's most ancient art forms also have a presence. Be sure and step outside to the Main Plaza, where you'll find Shigeo Kawashima's "Wa" ("Ring"). Painstakingly hand-built by the center's stagehands, the almost minimalist-looking, large-scale bamboo sculpture reveals its construction -- a network of hundreds of intricate knots -- only as you approach on foot.

Tradition and technology are on view in the Terrace Gallery, where you'll find a display of cutting-edge contemporary textile art. Taking its inspiration from the carp-shaped windsocks flown during the annual Kodomo No Hi ("Children's Day") holiday, the installation by designer Reiko Sudo of Tokyo's Nuno Corp. will evoke the shape, and the shimmering scales, of a giant koi.

-- Michael O'Sullivan

All shows run Thursday through Feb. 17. Visitors can preview Sudo's installation Monday at 6, when the artist will lead a tour. Tickets are $6. Call 202-467-4600 or visit http://www.kennedy-center.org.