Research Associate
Department: Japanese and Korean Art/Researcher on Japanese Prints

Current MIA Projects

Co-author, “Worldly Pleasures, Earthly Delights: Japanese Prints from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts,” 2011

Education

• B.A., Musashi university, British and American Studies

Background/Work History

Minneapolis Institute of Arts since 2001. Previously worked as a journalist, food and travel writer, editor, and translator.

Specialty/Area of Interest

Ukiyo-e art

Honors and Professional Associations

Member of the International Ukiyo-e Association

Selected Exhibitions and Projects

• Inventory of the Japanese woodblock print collection
• Curates the exhibitions in the Hill Japanese print gallery

Publications

• Four books on food and travel topics, most recently Bishoku Shinkaron (A Journey into Gastronomy), Tokyo: Shobunsha, 2002, reprinted 2003

Other Information

Yuiko came to work for the MIA as a volunteer in 2001. Under the guidance of Matthew Welch, curator of Japanese and Korean Art, she started cataloguing the Japanese woodblock collection—more than 3,000 objects—and translating the Japanese titles and inscriptions. It took three years. The main part of the collection is ukiyo-e, pictures of the everyday life of ordinary people in the Edo period (1615–1868). Ranging from early eighteenth-century hand-colored prints to nishiki-e (multi-colored prints) by such masters as Utamaro, Hokusai, and Hiroshige, the MIA’s ukiyo-e collection is considered one of the best in the United States. And ukiyo-e art has become Yuiko’s passion. Her primary interest is the development of city cultures, especially the food and restaurant culture in the Edo period in Japan.

Contact

(612) 870-6416
ykimura@artsmia.org

July 2012