The "Manggha" Centre of Japanese Art and Technology
Muzeum Sztuki i Techniki Japonskiej "Manggha"
Oddział Muzeum Narodowego w Krakowie
ul. M. Konopnickiej 26, 30-302 Kraków
Manager: Bogna Dziechciaruk-Maj
tel. (+48 12) 267 27 03, 267 37 53
fax (+48 12) 267 40 79
www.manggha.krakow.pl

Opening hours: Closed Mondays; open all other days, 10am-6pm.

The opening of the Manggha Centre of Japanese Art and Technology was the initiative of Andrzej Wajda and his wife, Krystyna Zachwatowicz, the set designer, who donated for this purpose the Inamori Foundation Prize awarded to Wajda for his life achievement as film and theatre director in 1987. In 1988 the twin cities of Kyoto and Cracow set up the Kyoto-Cracow Foundation in Cracow, and a division was opened in Kyoto with the objective of raising money to build the premises of the Centre. Owing to the involvement of leading artists, politicians and businessmen as well as of the government of Japan, and with the help of Cracow's authorities, the Centre inaugurated its activities in 1994 with the ceremonial opening by President Lech Walesa and Prince Takamado with his wife, who came to Poland specifically for the event.

Designed by a distinguished Japanese architect Arata Isozaki, the Centre's modern, asymetrical, elongated building erected on the left bank of the Vistula river combines features of both Japanese and Polish styles of construction. Polish sandstone was used to finish the walls, and the internal wood and brick structure is evocative of the Polish style of building. The arrangement and colours of the interiors are, in turn, characteristic of Japan. An imitation of crossing waves, the roof aligns the building with the current of the river, while at the same time bringing to mind a big oceanic wave and Hokusai's Great Wave at Kanagawa wood carving owned by the Museum. A Japanese garden surrounded by a bamboo grove and cherry trees was planted by the Centre, and the garden pavilion is the venue of traditional tea making ceremonies. There is a tea room and a shop selling Japanese porcelain and bonsai trees in the Museum, the Centre being, among others, the seat of the National Bonsai Club. In front of the building there is an ornamental pool adorned with a modern sculpture presented by Aiko Miyasawaki, a distinguished Japanese artist.

The Centre was built to house the National Museum in Cracow's collection of old Japanese art, numbering some 7,000 items and regarded as one of the largest on the European continent. At the core of the holdings is Feliks Jasienski's collection donated to the Museum in 1920. Jasienski was a collector and promoter of Japanese art and culture in Poland, as well as the author of a number of essays entitled Manggha after the famous Manga series of books of wood carvings by Katsushiki Hokusai, a property of the Museum. The holdings abound in wood carvings of portraits of women and actors, landscapes, images of flowers and birds, and battle scenes. Of note are also small ivory and wooden sculptures, beautifully decorated medicine boxes, ornamental netsuke toggles, lacquer and bronze objects, such as vases, candlesticks and statuettes, ceramics, textiles, costumes and the militaria, including armours made of lacquer-coated metal plates, famous katana samurai swords, guards and other ornamental parts of hilts. The holdings of old art are presented through a permanent exhibition at the Centre's gallery, the exhibits being successively rotated.

The temporary exhibition rooms are used to present contemporary Japanese art and, even more so, contemporary Japanese technology: railways, motorcycles, telecommunications equipment, robots, etc. The Centre is not only a museum, but also a champion of cultural exchange between Poland and Japan, and as such it organises concerts, performances by Japanese theatre companies, butoh dance shows, kendo and aikido fighting shows as well as presentations of the art of calligraphy, ikebana (flower arrangement) and origami (paper folding).

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