The exhibition focuses on the remarkable relation between the work of Zbyněk Sekal (1923–1998) and the visual aesthetics of the traditional Japanese culture, including its specific sensitiveness towards natural materials. The artist visited Japan twice during the last decade of his life (in 1989 and 1997), founding there a deep resonance between the traditional Japanese craft and his own creative activity. The project is based on the juxtaposition of selected examples of Sekal’s sculptural works, objects composed of used materials and collages on the one hand, and traditional Japanese applied art on the other. Important parts of the exhibition are his amateur photographs as well as excerpts from diaries related to Sekal’s two visits to Japan, which provide an authentic testimony of an encounter of a European and the traditional Japanese culture.

The works of Zbyněk Sekal and the collection of his photographs are loaned predominantly from his estate in Vienna and from private collections in the Czech Republic. The collection of Japanese arts and crafts comes from the National Museum – Náprstek Museum of Asian, African and American Cultures and is enriched by additional items from oriental collections of the National Gallery in Prague, the West Bohemian Museum in Pilsen, the Moravian Gallery in Brno and several chateaus in the Czech Republic.