Ever and Never Exhibition Opens in Tokyo
The primary reason for my trip to Asia was to attend the opening of Ever and Never: The Art of Peanuts at the Mori Art Center in Tokyo on Friday October 11.
Look who greeted me when I walked into my room at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. It made me feel warm and fuzzy – despite jet lag – ☺. The Imperial Hotels in Tokyo and Osaka have a license to use Snoopy. All of us connected with Peanuts were treated to a room featuring a welcoming Snoopy, towels, pillows and bathrobes. I know that this must make many visitors happy to find themselves in a such a warm environment.
Karen Johnson, Schulz Museum Director and I led a press tour through the exhibition. Here is our translator, Miss Yokota, who did a wonderful job for us with a great sense of humor. Snoopy, representing one of the sponsors of the exhibition, MetLife Alico, stands patiently like a good dog!
The exhibition takes the visitor through Sparky’s childhood with pictures of his parents and Spike and then very cleverly displays his Li’l Folks drawings.
A paneled room looking very much like a den displays Sparky’s hockey artifacts…
and tennis artifacts…
and golf artifacts.
All of the over one hundred strips were framed for transport, and in order to keep them from damage, we required that they remain in their frames. So the exhibit designers created these cases in order to have a better viewing flow in the gallery.
Many of the strips had a projection above with the Japanese translation.
Amy Schulz Johnson’s comment made memorable in the the comic strip of May 28, 1961 is on the wall in vinyl relief.
Several rooms displayed product from past eras.
Dinah Houghtaling (second from left), who is in charge of our traveling exhibitions and who arrived a week before the opening in order to do condition reports on each item, FINALLY has a chance to relax the night of the opening. Here with Melissa Menta, Vice President of Communications for Peanuts Worldwide, and Wakako Tsunoda and Hiroko Nakamura of Sony Creative Products, our agent in Japan. Melissa arrived with me for the opening, and Hiroko supported Dinah during long days at the installation.
The invitation-only reception the night before the official opening on Saturday the 12th was a happy time with congratulations for a beautifully crafted exhibition, appreciation to our sponsors, and it also provided a happy reunion for friends who have known each other through Peanuts for many years.
I told visitors in my welcoming talk that this exhibition in the Mori Art Gallery, Tokyo, has been four years in the planning. Because of that and the space available here, they are able to show more artifacts and more comic strips in one exhibition than has ever been shown. All of us at the Museum are rightfully proud of what the Asahi Shimbun Cultural Projects Department has created.
—Jean Schulz
