Russel Wong in Kyoto – Extended by popular demand!

Russel Wong in Kyoto

29 November 2021 to 10 April 2022

Asian Civilisations Museum

Free

ACM x Russel Wong’s collaboration extended – and expanded! ACM’s special exhibition Russel Wong in Kyoto will now run through 10 April 2022. On 29 November, a whole new section of Kyoto photographs will open to the public. ACM’s expanded Russel Wong in Kyoto displays 37 additional black and white prints and several new colour images from the photographer’s ongoing personal project to document the geisha community of Kyoto. This new selection sheds further light on rarely seen and lesser-known traditions of this private community. The images tell stories of traditional and contemporary Japan, revealing how one often merges into the other. Over 70 black-and-white photographs illustrate customs and traditions of geishas – called “geiko” in Kyoto. The tea ceremony, dance, dressing up, and the lesser known Erikae ceremony, a two-week process where a maiko (geiko in training) prepares herself to become a geiko, are explored. The extension of this special exhibition allows visitors another chance to dive deeper into Kyoto’s culture, and celebrates Russel Wong’s gift of all the photographs in the show to ACM and the Singapore National Collection.