It only takes a few minutes to cross the ocean and the ages to Japan and China. And you can do it for free at the recently reopened Asian Art Galleries at our own internationally known Birmingham Museum of Art.

Bring the fiercest video game warrior in your family for a look at the armor, helmets, blades and guns that make our Samurai collection the only display of its kind in the Southeast. Or reach out and touch a 250-pound jade boulder from the Kunlun Mountains in northwest China, a stone considered by the ancients to have protective qualities.

"One of the great joys of jade is how it feels," said Don Wood, Virginia and William M. Spencer III Curator of Asian Art. "The Museum acquired this boulder so you could touch and feel for yourself jade's cool, almost sensuous surface."

From swords to stones and so much more, the collection started more than 35 years ago with gifts from many different individuals who wanted to share their own collections with the community they loved.  Over the years, with support in acquisitions and educational activities from the Birmingham Asian Art Society, the Museum now has more than 4,000 objects in one of the finest and most comprehensive collections of Asian art in the United States.

Thanks to the redesigned galleries, more of the permanent collection is on display than ever before, including swords, stones and everything in between.

"Many of the objects on view either have not been seen for many years or have never been seen by the public,” Wood said. “The redesign gives us the chance to show the remarkable breadth and depth of our collections."

China
Thousands of years of Chinese history are on display, including rare funerary goods, Imperial jades, full sets of tomb figures from the 8th and 15th centuries, and an entire wall of blue and white porcelain, with nearly 100 examples from all periods.

A 15^th-century Buddhist temple mural forms the centerpiece of the Chinese gallery and will continue to reveal its secrets as work continue to uncover areas previously damanged by fire.

“A conservator will work on-site to open a ‘window’ of cleaning on the reverse side of the mural,” said Wood. “This presents opportunities for discoveries that have been covered for centuries under dust and smoke.”

After you’ve touched the jade boulder, you can also appreciate the beauty of the Chinese gallery in the jade collection of Mrs. Georg Vetlesen, on long-term loan from the Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian Institute and seen now for the first time in 25 years.  This collection is famous for its Imperial Chinese jades from the 16^th through the 19^th centuries.

For lovers of Chinese blue and white porcelain, there are also more than 100 examples on display, ranging in age from the 14^th through the 19^th centuries.

Japan
The Samurai display returns as a focal point in the Japanese galleries, which also includes a variety of new hanging scrolls and folding screens that will be rotated in the painting and sculpture gallery.

Take a closer look at the Museum’s growing collection of Japanese Buddhist sculpture, including a rare 12^th-century image of Jizo Bosatsu, one of Japan’s favorite Buddhist deities of Mercy. Dressed plainly as a Buddhist monk, this deity helps travelers in distress, small children in trouble, and women in labor.

Featured for the first time from the Museum's permanent collection are outstanding Japanese decorative arts of the Meiji period (1868-1912). After 250 years of self-imposed isolation, Japan opened to the West in the mid-19th century, creating an artistic craze for anything Japanese. Artists such as Monet, Tiffany, Whistler, and others were influence by the astounding creativity of Japanese art.

"The Japanese long have played an important role in our own culture and their profound effect on the decorative arts can be seen in other areas of our own collection," said Gail Andrews, R. Hugh Daniel Director of the Museum. "For instance, we have examples of pieces by Tiffany & Company and American crazy quilts, both influenced in their own way by Japanese artwork."

“Together with our Korean, Indian, and southeast Asian collections, these new galleries and the holdings of our Museum library offers considerable resources for scholars of Asian art, history, and culture,” said Wood.

And there is more to come, with new installations in the Indian sculpture gallery and the Southeast Asian ceramic gallery, including what experts say will be the finest collection of Vietnamese ceramics in the U.S.

Get a closer look
Look for updates on these and other upcoming exhibits at the Birmingham Museum of Art, located in the cultural district in downtown Birmingham. You can visit the Asian Art Collection or any other part of the permanent collection for free or pay a few dollars ($5 members/$10 non-members) to join senior curator Don Wood for a special Art in Conversation gallery talk at 10:30 a.m. on Sept. 3.

NOTE: To learn more about the Art in Conversation series, contact Rhonda Hethcox or call 254-2070. Programs are designed to provide additional information about art in an informal and interactive setting. You may pay at the door for each event or sign up for the whole series.

Look for other free events, including Sunday Topic Tours at 2 p.m. In September, you can explore
- Artifacts and Objects in the American Galleries on Sept. 20
- Creating the Mythic American West Sculpture and Painting on Sept. 27.

Museum hours are Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. Click here or call 254-2565 to learn more about special events or support this great institution as a member of the Museum.