Into the Waters with Senju and Bingyi: Two Contemporary Paintings

Into the Waters with Senju and Bingyi: Two Contemporary Paintings brings together work by internationally recognized artists Hiroshi Senju and Bingyi, focusing on water as more than a visual subject. In their practices, water becomes a material, a working method, and a way to consider time, memory, nature, creativity, and human survival.

The exhibition places the artists’ distinct approaches in conversation with one another. Senju transforms Japanese painting traditions through contemporary techniques, turning observed waterfalls into idealized, abstract visions. Bingyi often works outdoors, responding intuitively to the forces of nature while drawing on Chinese ink painting and philosophy. Together, their works ask how water can be both enduring and vulnerable, nurturing and destructive, and how artists might blur the boundary between human creativity and the natural environment.

Bingyi’s work is presented across three hanging scrolls, combining splashed ink, marks shaped by sea air, and deliberate brushwork to suggest a swirling movement of water and petals. Senju’s folding screens recall both the dripping surfaces of ceramic glazes and waterfall imagery found in the museum’s collections. The installation invites visitors to experience water’s beauty, mystery, force, and essential place in human life.

When: April 2–September 27, 2026

Venue: National Museum of Asian Art

Location: East Building, Gallery 25

Collection Areas: Chinese Art, Contemporary Art, and Japanese Art

Artists: Hiroshi Senju and Bingyi

Works: Contemporary paintings by Hiroshi Senju and Bingyi, including Bingyi’s three-scroll ink work and Senju’s folding-screen waterfall paintings

Themes: Water, nature, time, memory, Japanese and Chinese artistic traditions, environmental vulnerability, creativity, survival, and the relationship between artist and environment

Videos: The exhibition page includes an approximately eight-minute dialogue in which Senju and Bingyi discuss their artistic practices, influences from Japanese and Chinese art, and ideas including time, memory, survival, and creativity.

Accessibility: Exhibition wall and case text is available online in a format that can be resized or read with a screen reader. A descriptive transcript is also provided for the “Artists in Dialogue” video.

Tickets: Price not available