Exhibition

Friendship Through Culture

Erik Sano — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 15:03:51 +0000

Friendship Through Culture Erik Sano Feb 23, 2026

Dates

March 1, 2026 10:00am - May 29, 2026 7:00pm

Event Category

Friendship through Culture (2026) / 文化がわかる。心がかよう。 (2026)

JCCC Community Arts Exhibition

The Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre is pleased to present Friendship Through Culture (2026), a community arts exhibition reflecting on the evolving meanings of a phrase that has long shaped Japanese Canadian cultural life.

This year’s exhibition explores the evolving meanings of a phrase that has long shaped Japanese Canadian cultural life. What first emerged as a gentle expression of survival and resilience in the face of discrimination has shifted over time into an open, if complex, practice of belonging. Today, Friendship Through Culture (2026) carries multiple potential interpretations—diasporic, generational, newly arrived, and hybrid—and asks us how culture can both preserve memory and create new ways of living together.

Exhibition Dates: March 1 – May 29, 2026

The exhibition features original works across a range of media, including painting, photography, textiles, sculpture, installation, video, and craft.

Browse Works:

Works 1 - 60 Works 61 - 139

Full List of Artists:

Select the Artists name to be taken directly to their work

Zere Abylgazina
David Akio
Asai
Asobu Art Collective
Laura Beaton
Janice Mende Bennink
David Bernhard
Connie Bist
Myroslava Boikiv
Declan Boushy
Diana Bullock
Elena Butkov
Marilena Isacescu Carlea
Chris Corridore
Barbara Eguchi
Lindsay Erdman
Alana Keiko Fleming
Elaine Hamelin-Mitchell | Rosso Art & Design
Steven Hasegawa
Hyedie Hashimoto
Deborah Hatanaka
Tibi Hegyesi
Kentaro Imoto
Neli Iordanova
Ruth A. Mora Izturriaga
Lakshmi Preethi Kamak
Kioni
Amy Lee
Tsutao Machida
Mihoko Maeno
Carin Katagiri Mahon
Michael Marcynuk
Betty Mochizuki
Stephen North
Mariana I. Padilla
Electra Pappa
Maryam Pazooki
Nancy Peng
Karen Perlmutter
Tamiko Potts
Michelle Ramos
Mio Reynolds
Riki
Robottobani
Karen Sekikawa 関河カレン
 Keiko Shintani
Thomas.A. Sokoloski
SOWL
Brenda Spielmann
Ken Sugamori
Manabu Takaishi
Jerrold Tanaka
Mui-Ling Teh
Beverley Thum
Yuki Tokita
Weichan Wang
Ebru Winegard
Rita Wong
Queenie Xu
Deniz Yilmaz
Ryo Yonekawa
Yu
Zhan Zhang

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Phase in My Journey Exhibition

Samphors Say — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 23:26:48 +0000

Phase in My Journey Exhibition Samphors Say Mar 3, 2025

Dates

April 5, 2025 10:00am - June 30, 2025 7:00pm

Event Category

The JCCC Arts Committee is pleased to announce that we will be participating in the CONTACT Photography Festival once again! Phase in my Journey, featuring artist Walter Borchenko and curated by Shin Sugino, will be on view from April 5 to June 30, 2025.

More about the show

The work of Canadian-born photographer Walter Borchenko represents a profound and singular exploration of the Modernist photographic aesthetic. This 20-year retrospective traces a remarkable journey, beginning with the evocative self-portrait, Self Portrait, Hollywood Florida (2006), and culminating in the integration of infra-red techniques in Grassy Brook - Talbot River Road (2024). Borchenko's work transcends homage, evolving the Modernist tradition into something new: a "Modernist evolved" aesthetic rather than a postmodern reinterpretation.

Over the last two decades, Borchenko has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to the principles of Modernist photography. His dedication to achieving the essence of the image through meticulous camera work, optics, and lighting- eschewing heavy digital manipulation—is a rare practice in contemporary photography. The singularity of his approach is further heightened by his use of consistent digital capture technology throughout this period, providing continuity and integrity to his artistic evolution.

Borchenko's images are further elevated through the use of hand-made Japanese Awagami paper, which imbues his prints with a tactile depth and subtlety that harmonizes with the Modernist ethos. The Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre is honored to present this unique and memorable exhibition, celebrating Borchenko's evolution of Modernist photography and his contribution to its legacy.

An Artist Talk will take place on May 24 at 2:00pm as part of Doors Open. See details here.

Spirit Place: The Magnificent Woodcut Art of Naoko Matsubara

Samphors Say — Tue, 27 Aug 2024 16:40:04 +0000

Spirit Place: The Magnificent Woodcut Art of Naoko Matsubara Samphors Say Aug 27, 2024

Dates

September 25, 2024 7:00pm-January 3, 2025 12:00pm

Event Category

Please note that the exhibit is now closing on January 3rd, 2025 at 12PM due to unforeseen circumstances. This is a few hours earlier than announced prior. Apologies for any inconvenience.

Nature is a sweeping backdrop of inspiration for renowned Japanese Canadian woodcut artist Naoko Matsubara. A distinguished print artist known for creating cheerful and joyful works, Matsubara’s images range from black and white to vibrant colour, intimate to monumental, playful to contemplative.

Spirit Place will explore the work and remarkable career of Naoko Matsubara. Since 1960, Matsubara has had over 80 exhibitions around the world, but none have focused on her creative process and the influence of nature and the architecture of her studio. Spirit Place acts not only as a retrospective of Matsubara’s work, but also a reflection on her creative process and the influence of nature, spirituality, and the studio where she works – her spirit place.

Forty dynamic woodcut prints will hang in the JCCC Art Gallery, along with her rollers, paints, brushes and handmade paper. Photographs depicting Matsubara in process in her studio will be hung, and a short documentary featuring the artist, her work, and her studio, will premiere.

Please join us for our opening reception on September 25th from 7-9:30 PM.

Opening Reception

More programming to be announced shortly!

Unchanging and Changing and Changing

Samphors Say — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 20:35:54 +0000

Unchanging and Changing and Changing Samphors Say Oct 31, 2023

Dates

September 23, 2023 10:00am - November 25, 2023 5:00pm

Event Category

Exhibition

Heritage

Community Event

'Unchanging and changing and changing' is a solo exhibition and collaborative Nihon-buyō dance & Taiko drum performance by Alexa Kumiko Hatanaka that features wearable paper artworks that are imbued with the life of the performers alongside the histories of craft and place that inform them.

A reflection on well-being and selfhood, the works unite and contrast needs for protective armours and “inverse armours,” the latter activated by dance, music, and friends to encourage expression and joy. Hatanaka reflects on personal aftershocks from tsunamis, both real and metaphorical. Her work integrates her formative childhood experience in dance at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre and is steeped with her recent time spent at a fourth generation paper mill in Japan. Her ethereal work collapse time and string together interconnected histories held within the threads, repairs and fibres of her practice: ancestral ties; the lineage of printmaking, inks, and natural dyes; personal narratives incorporating past printmaking blocks; and scraps of papers sewn into the next and the next work.

Videos share both a look at the Opening Night performance and the intergenerational experience of the papermakers in Japan and an intimate look at Hatanaka’s process while she was immersed in the very lands and community that create the specific paper she has used for over a decade. She intentionally chose a paper that is delicate yet strong, and heartfully shares its possibility into the future and its significance as an over 1000 year sustainable craft technology.

WASHI & ARTIST'S PROCESS

“The softness of the Japanese washi paper and its transparency represents the environment where the natural materials were picked, under a clear sky and near a magnificent river. The warmth and robustness of Japanese washi paper comes from the efforts of farmers and their love for this land where they have lived for several generations. It is thanks to this strong bond between people and nature that the Kashiki paper production company was able to produce Japanese washi paper.” — Kashiki Seishi, fourth generation paper mill in Japan where Hatanaka was an artist in residence.

The durability of washi and the tenacity of its long-standing techniques behave as a symbol for resilience that resonates with Hatanaka’s diasporic identity. A dynamic bond between material and body is present, resulting in personal reflections on the various ways that connections to ancestral crafts nurture a meaningful integration of art-making, identity-making, and community-building.

In her linocut print work, Hatanaka embeds impressions in the washi to convey topographical imageries that resemble chiseled snow, stone, water, earthquakes, or the gesture of a map. These organic forms use pattern-making and repetition to reference mental and emotional geographies as much as physical ones.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & CONTRIBUTORS

Curator: Chiedza Pasipanodya

Nihon Buyo Dance & Taiko Drum Performance: Danielle Yamashita, Katherine Yamashita, Jody Chan, Wy Joung Kou

Musical Performance: Benja, Peach Luffe

DJs: DJ Velma

Documentary Video & Photography: Johnny Nghiem

Collaborative Photo Work: Maya Fuhr, Holly Chang, Ashok Mathur

Advisory Support: Johnny Le

Fabrication: Yorgo Liapis, Dylan Moore

Washi Wearable Modelling: Benja, Peach Luffe, Sima Sepehri, Elissa Mielke, YGC, Leah Mersky, Felicia Daisy, Mist Walker

Production Assistance: Akash Inbakumar, Yahn Nemirovsky, Felicia Daisy, Gideon Näf, Danny Cardoso

Graphic Design: Christine Xia

Performance Video: Zachary Hertzman and Johnny Nghiem

Special thanks to Kashiki Seishi, Kayoko Ichinomiya, Patel Brown Gallery, Studio RAW and Raging Asian Womxn Taiko Drummers, Victor Chin, Max McLarty, Deborah and Glenn Hatanaka, Julie Cawthorne, Miao Liu, Cybèle Young, Tatsuyuki Kitaoka, Sameer Cash, Crispin Day, James Arthurs, Su Yen Chong, Mayumi Lashbrook, Claire Shea, John Donald, JCCC Art Committee and Ayame Kai dancers: Susan, Jackie and Tami, Hisanao Kataoka, Akari Kataoka, Chi Family, and The Japanese Paper Place.

This exhibition was made possible through generous funding from the Canada Council of the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.

藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe Opening Reception

Yayoi — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 20:33:50 +0000

藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe Opening Reception Yayoi Sep 30, 2026

Dates

January 16, 2027 2:00pm - 4:00pm

Event Category

Community Event

Exhibition

Artist Talk

Sachiko Watanabe will share the story of ai (indigo), from growing plants to making dye material, demonstrating the traditional tools and techniques used to transform indigo plants into dye. Through her artwork and personal experiences, she will discuss the various indigo dyeing methods, her deep connection with nature, her lifestyle and the role that love and care play in her creative practice.

The presentation will include:

An introduction to the cultivation of indigo, the preparation of natural dye, and the artistic process behind her work.
A video presentation showcasing her life, practice and creative journey.
A Q&A session with the audience.

Exhibition info

Artist bio:

Sachiko Watanabe (渡辺幸子) was born in 1977 in Ehime Prefecture, Japan. After studying textile design at Musashino Art University in Tokyo, she encountered natural indigo dye at the Iyo Kasuri Centre in Ehime. This encounter marked the beginning of a practice that has continued for more than 20 years. Sachiko later moved to Onomichi, Hiroshima, where she developed her work with indigo. Today, she grows her own indigo plants on Mukaishima, an island off the coast of Onomichi. She combines her harvest with sukumo, traditionally fermented indigo leaves from Tokushima Prefecture, to create her own natural dye. Living in a traditional Japanese house, where she also exhibits and sells her work, Sachiko continues to work closely with indigo each day. Through her textiles, she hopes to share its quiet beauty and to remind us of the natural world that surrounds and embraces us.

Her exhibitions include Indigo in Our Daily Lives (2019), Indigo, Simultaneously (2021), Indigo in Winter (2021), Indigo in Darkness (2022), and Intaking Indigo (2024)

Photo: © Toshinori Tanaka

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藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe

Yayoi — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 19:39:38 +0000

藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe Yayoi Sep 30, 2026

Dates

January 17, 2027 10:00am - March 7, 2027 7:00pm

Event Category

Exhibition

For over twenty years, Sachiko Watanabe has lived with indigo — growing it, fermenting it, dyeing with it, and shaping her days around its rhythms. Traveling from her home in Japan, she brings this quiet, deeply personal practice to the JCCC for the first time. Rooted in one of Japan's oldest natural dyeing traditions, natural indigo sukumo fermentation, this exhibition invites you to slow down and step into her world — to see, touch, and feel the colour of a life shaped by patience, land, and time. Join us in welcoming her to Toronto.

About the Exhibition

The exhibition follows the full life cycle of indigo — from seed to sukumo, from vat to fabric, from field to everyday life. Visitors will encounter:

The Making of Sukumo — a year-long journey through sowing, transplanting, harvesting, drying, and fermenting indigo leaves
Shades of Indigo — a study of the many named hues within the indigo spectrum, from pale aijiro(藍白) to deep kachi-iro(搗色)
Textiles & Objects — a curated collection of dyed khadi, cotton, linen, hemp, and wool pieces, shaped by Sachiko's hand
Everyday Indigo — an invitation to touch, smell, and wrap yourself in indigo cloth
Living with Indigo — a reflection on more than twelve years spent in an old farmhouse, where growing, fermenting, and dyeing indigo have become inseparable from daily life

Opening Reception & Artist Talk

Please join us on January 16 at 2pm

More Info

Workshops

Details coming soon!

Artist bio:

Her exhibitions include Indigo in Our Daily Lives (2019), Indigo, Simultaneously (2021), Indigo in Winter (2021), Indigo in Darkness (2022), and Intaking Indigo (2024)

Photo: © Toshinori Tanaka

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Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada Opening Reception

Erik Sano — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 15:32:48 +0000

Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada Opening Reception Erik Sano Sep 30, 2026

Dates

October 29, 2026 6:30pm - 8:30pm

Event Category

Exhibition

Social

Please join us to celebrate the opening of the exhibit, Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada, as well as its companion piece, The Exophonia! Meet the curator and artists and get a first look at our new temporary exhibit. Find out more about the exhibits Many Voices & The Exophonia.

Light refreshments will be served. All are welcome!

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The Exophonia

Erik Sano — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 16:05:58 +0000

The Exophonia Erik Sano Sep 30, 2026

Dates

October 29, 2026 10:00am-September 30, 2027 7:00pm

Event Category

Exhibition

Xuan Ye’s animation, The Exphonia, transforms the ICNALE corpus, hundreds of L2 (second language) English essays on part‑time jobs and smoking bans, into a living monument to exophony, the act of speaking and writing in a non‑native tongue.

Each essay becomes a root system that germinates, forks, and twists in real time. Grammatical deviations and non‑native word combinations physically warp the tendrils and diverge the rhizomes.

The metaphor of the rhizome is reimagined as a cross‑cultural ecology in which linguistic markedness is not a flaw, but the very soil from which an astonishing forest emerges.

Developed through a residency at the JCCC over the summer of 2026, Exophonia acts as a companion piece to the Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada exhibit in the Moriyama Nikkei Heritage Centre, extending its insights on linguistic non-standardness and non-nativeness to our hyper-globalized reality.

Artist bio:

Xuan Ye makes noise as a compass, navigating the intersections of art, music, and technology. Their practice unfolds across software, sound, image, installation, performance, publication, and teaching, tracing the diffraction and resonance across technological, biological, and ecological systems. Their work has been exhibited at the Centre for Culture and Technology (2025), Kamias Triennial (2024), MOCA Toronto (2022), UCCA Shanghai (2022), Venice Architecture Biennale (2021), MUTEK Montreal (2021), InterAccess (2020), and Goethe-Institut Beijing (2018), among others. They have been recognized with residencies at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity (2026), University of Toronto (2025/26), ZHdK (2024), and Pro Helvetia (2023), and have received grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, Partners in Art, and SSHRC. Their work has been featured in Peripheral Review, Canadian Art, ArtAsiaPacific, KUNSTFORUM International, and Musicworks. Originally from China, Ye lives in Toronto/Tkaronto and is an Assistant Professor at the University of Waterloo.

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Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada

Erik Sano — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 14:51:24 +0000

Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada Erik Sano Sep 30, 2026

Dates

October 29, 2026 10:00am-September 30, 2027 7:00pm

Event Category

Exhibition

Japanese languages have been spoken in Canada since the late 1800s. From nisei nihongo to language schools to the rise of Japanese as a global language, Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada explores how Japanese languages have been used through multiple waves of migration, settlement, and displacement. Featuring ethnographic comics by Dr. Ai Taniguchi based on interviews with Japanese Canadians, the exhibit celebrates the breadth of experience with the language amongst the Japanese Canadian community.

The exhibit's companion new media art piece, The Exophonia by Xuan Ye, interrogates the permeability of native and non-native speaker distinctions through the metaphor of a rhizome stemming from linguistic markedness. Check it out here.

Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada was developed in partnership the Canadian Language Museum and the University of Toronto Mississauga.

Please join us for the opening reception on October 29! Find more information here.

Images:
2. A Group Portrait of Toronto Japanese Language School, 1960. JCCC George Tsushima Collection, 2011.298.01.11.
3. Kohaku Uta Gassen at JCCC, ca. 1980s. JCCC Tomiko Nishimura Collection 2016-24-11-103.
4. Toronto Japanese Language School registration form, ca. 1960s. JCCC Coby Kobayashi Collection, 2007.04.03.143.

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Paradise

Erik Sano — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 18:13:55 +0000

Paradise Erik Sano Aug 17, 2026

Dates

October 3, 2026 7:00pm-January 3, 2027 7:00pm

Event Category

Exhibition

The JCCC Gallery's fall exhibition is Paradise: a multimedia installation by Japanese Canadian artists and longtime family friends Mitchell Akiyama and Emma Nishimura that explores intergenerational inheritance. Combining print, video, and sculpture, the work reflects on their relationship to the legacy of Japanese Canadian internment experienced by their paternal grandparents.

The exhibition draws on a shared childhood memory of a summer day in Northern Ontario, where the artists and their siblings built a temporary "Frog Paradise." This moment of play, shaped by a sense of safety and belonging, becomes a lens for considering how one group’s utopia can exist alongside another’s harm. The installation includes video that intercuts footage of this experience with recent visits to former internment sites in British Columbia.

Bridging personal narrative and historical context, Paradise examines the forced relocation and incarceration of Japanese Canadians, tracing how this legacy continues to shape memory, displacement, and belonging across generations.

Nuit Blanche at the JCCC: October 3^rd at 7pm

7pm — Artist Talk
Hear from Mitchell Akiyama and Emma Nishimura as they discuss the ideas, memories, and histories behind Paradise!

9pm — Origami Frog Workshop
Join the artists for a hands-on workshop inspired by the exhibition’s "Frog Paradise."

Opening Reception

Please join us on October 25^th from 2 to 4pm
Opening Reception

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Exhibition

Friendship Through Culture

Friendship through Culture (2026) / 文化がわかる。心がかよう。 (2026)

JCCC Community Arts Exhibition

Browse Works:

Works 1 - 60 Works 61 - 139

Full List of Artists:

Phase in My Journey Exhibition

Spirit Place: The Magnificent Woodcut Art of Naoko Matsubara

Unchanging and Changing and Changing

WASHI & ARTIST'S PROCESS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & CONTRIBUTORS

藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe Opening Reception

Artist Talk

Artist bio:

藍 ai - A life of creativity in Indigo by Sachiko Watanabe

About the Exhibition

Opening Reception & Artist Talk

Workshops

Artist bio:

Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada Opening Reception

The Exophonia

Artist bio:

Many Voices: Japanese Languages in Canada

Paradise

Nuit Blanche at the JCCC: October 3rd at 7pm

Opening Reception

Nuit Blanche at the JCCC: October 3^rd at 7pm