Arts

"Mandala-Q," an artwork by Mirai Mizue, is currently showing in the International Terminal at Fukuoka Airport. It is part of a Japanese government-backed push to promote artwork through the country's airports. (Screenshot from "Culture Gate to Japan" website)  
Arts

Japan boosts global art-hub ambitions

Government and private sector view culture as a growth industry

24 September 2021
In her latest book, "Eat the Buddha," Barbara Demick gives a human face and an intense sense of personal travail to one of Asia's most intractable injustices. (Nikkei montage; Cover image from Random House, author photo by Madeleine Grant) 
Arts

Book Review: Lessons in life and death from small-town Tibetans

Barbara Demick's 'Eat the Buddha' highlights personal impact of Chinese rule

22 September 2021
Hideki "Yoda" Suematsu, Takaakira "Taka" Goto, and Tamaki Kunishi of the Tokyo-based Instrumental Rock band MONO. The band's 11th studio album "Pilgrimage of the Soul" was released on September 17. (Photo by Ken Kobayashi)
Arts

20-year pilgrimage of the soul: MONO's requiem for a pandemic

Tokyo group's new album takes their classic-infused noise rock to the next level

21 September 2021
Jean-Paul Belmondo, left, shot to international fame with the film Breathless.
Obituaries

Jean-Paul Belmondo, a national treasure of French cinema

Talented actor charmed movigoers around the world

13 September 2021
The plane in which Lin Biao tried to escape to the Siberian city of Irkutsk crashed in the eastern Mongolian desert on Sept. 13, 1971. All nine on board were killed, including Lin Biao's wife, son and close aides. (Photo courtesy of Yu Ruxin and New Century Press)
Arts

Shedding new light on a 50-year-old Chinese mystery

Yu Ruxin takes a fresh look at the death of Mao's former designated heir Lin Biao

13 September 2021
In "Minamata," Johnny Depp, right, stars as American photojournalist W. Eugene Smith, who documented the deadly effects of industrial mercury pollution in Minamata, Japan. (Vertigo Releasing/screen grab from YouTube) 
Arts

Minamata mercury tragedy gets Hollywood treatment

New film gives flawed view of the American photojournalist who exposed poisoning scandal

10 September 2021
Yoshiki gives recital at Carnegie Hall in New York in 2017.
20 years after 9/11

X Japan's Yoshiki sees music as a potential cure for trauma

Philanthropist and rock 'n' roller has been supporting disaster victims since 1995

10 September 2021
"Children reading a history book" features two figures looking at a page that simply says "Remember." 
20 years after 9/11

Minako Yoshino sculpts messages to the future

Japanese sculptor hopes her work will help connect a divided world

9 September 2021
Thai film "Anatomy of Time," directed by Jakrawal Nilthamrong, will have its world premiere at the Venice International Film Festival on Sept. 10. Domestic screenings, however, will have to wait while theaters remain closed due to the pandemic. (Courtesy of Diversion, Damned Films, Sluizer Film Productions, M'GO Films, Mit Out Sound Films)
Arts

Thai films struggle at home amid international praise

Pandemic-related cinema closures threaten local movie renaissance

8 September 2021
Mohsen Makhmalba: director, novelist, human rights activist.
20 years after 9/11

Mohsen Makhmalbaf warns of extremists

Iranian filmmaker worries over fate of journalists and artists stuck in Afghanistan

7 September 2021
The poster for the Shigeko Kubota exhibition at the National Museum of Art, Osaka, features a 1972 photo of the artist by Tom Haar. (Original photo in poster © Tom Haar)
Arts

Japanese video-art pioneer honored at last

Shigeko Kubota blended sculpture and high technology

6 September 2021
The legacy of Sri Lanka's civil war looms large in Anuk Arudpragasam's second book, "A Passage North," which has been longlisted for this year’s Booker Prize. (Nikkei montage/Photos courtesy of Granta Books, Ruvin De Silva)
Arts

Book review: Trauma lingers in novel about Sri Lanka's civil war

Young Tamil author ponders human costs of violence and the nature of love

3 September 2021
Nepalese artifacts that were repatriated after being stolen. From left: the head of a 12th-century statue of the Hindu goddess Saraswati, a 10th-century Uma Maheshwar-themed stone carving, and a stone statue of Buddha. (Courtesy of the National Museum of Nepal)
Arts

Hunting for Nepal's stolen idols

Global awareness of widespread theft is leading to recoveries

1 September 2021
Fashion startup Arlnata uses silk kimono fabrics for its ready-to-wear clothing, most of which is Western-style. Based in Japan, the brand presented its first collection in April 2019. (Courtesy of Arlnata)
Arts

Taking kimono silk to the next fashion level

Japanese startup aims at international market for luxury clothing

25 August 2021
Philip Cornwel-Smith says his latest book "is not a guide to places and things. It's more of a guide to why Bangkok is the way it is, and how it became like that."  (Nikkei montage/Cover design by Xavier Comas of Cover Kitchen; portrait photo by Cedric Arnold)
Arts

'Very Bangkok' becomes face of Thailand

Popular ode to the Thai capital fronts pavilion at global cities festival

22 August 2021
Posters for popular Malaysian films, from left, "Sheep without a Shepherd," "On Your Mark" and "Barbarian Invasion." These films are among the growing number of productions by Chinese Malaysian directors that are finding an enthusiastic audience in China. (Nikkei montage/photos courtesy of Da Huang Pictures and Astro Shaw)
Arts

Chinese Malaysian directors sweep China's box office

Foreign filmmakers win audiences and snare prestigious festival awards

20 August 2021
In his new book, "Has Asia Lost It? Dynamic Past, Turbulent Future," author Vasuki Shastry is essentially saying that after you read all about Asia's achievements and potential, it is time to learn about how the bottom tiers of society have made insufficient gains. (Nikkei montage; source photos by World Scientific and Getty Images)
Arts

Book Review: Has Asia (really) lost it?

The region's gleaming exterior hides myriad social problems, including widespread poverty and a self-entitled elite

13 August 2021
A still from "Sexual Drive": The film inhabits the gray area often claimed by art house cinema but has strong sexual undertones. (Courtesy of Film Movement) 
Arts

Japanese director gives stylish new twists to food fetishes

With 'Sexual Drive,' soft-core director finds international appeal

8 August 2021
In her debut novel, Emma Larkin displays an anthropological authenticity that transcends language. (Nikkei montage/source photo by Reuters)
Arts

Book review: Ghosts of history haunt Bangkok's urban jungle

From slum life to high society, Emma Larkin's debut novel highlights resistance and ennui in Thai metropolis

6 August 2021
Makoto Azuma stands beside a frozen flower sculpture he created in Hokkaido, Japan's northernmost main island. (Courtesy of Shunsuke Shiinoki)
Arts

Japanese artist finds new style of flower power

New York floral 'sculpture' will celebrate fight against COVID-19

4 August 2021
“The Art of Thai Comics: A Century of Strips and Stripes,“ by Thailand-based academic Nicolas Verstappen, right, is a long-overdue tribute to a succession of dazzling yet little-known local comic artists. (Nikkei montage/Source photos by River Books and Sukanya Sompiboon, 2019)
Arts

For Belgian author, Thai comics are no laughing matter

History of graphic tales honors forgotten heroes of local pop culture

2 August 2021
To cope with mood swings and anxiety exacerbated by COVID, Taiwanese filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang has turned to his self-taught hobby of painting: 'I don't think of loneliness as something negative.' (Photo courtesy of Tsai Ming-liang)
Arts

Celebrated Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-liang discovers painting

Auteur of loneliness reckons with the isolation of COVID-19

23 July 2021
Yoko Ono performs onstage in Japan in 1974. For all the negative criticism her first solo album attracted decades ago, its influence can be heard in later rock music styles ranging from punk to new wave to grunge. (Getty Images)
Arts

Yoko Ono's big scream still echoes, and surprises

Reissue of Japanese artist's early recordings contains the seeds of an unwittingly influential sound

22 July 2021
People browse books at the Hong Kong Book Fair on July 19. The event was once regarded as a symbol of publishing freedom in the territory under the "one country, two systems" arrangement.
Politics

At tense Hong Kong Book Fair, buyers snap up political titles

Some authors and sellers withdraw items, fearing China-imposed security law

21 July 2021
Rudra in 2013: from left, Kathir, Simon, Vinod and Shiva. “We came up with the term Vedic metal because [the genre] fuses ancient Indian philosophy and music, especially folk-traditional and classical, with extreme metal,” said Kathir, Rudra’s singer and bass player. (Courtesy of Rudra)
Arts

Southeast Asian Vedic heavy metal rocks China's extreme music scene

Beijing label resurrects Singaporean band Rudra's genre-shaping early albums

16 July 2021