The Ghibli Museum presents a new special exhibition on June 1, 2013.
There are many things around us that involve the use of lenses, such as a pair of glasses or contact lenses. Nowadays, the lenses inside the camera of our mobile phones are perhaps the most common. So how is such a familiar object created and how does it work? One would imagine that not many people may be able to answer that question.
Thanks to the lenses inside film projectors, Studio Ghibli's movies can be shown on large screens for many people to enjoy. More than 2000 years ago, people discovered that wonderful images would come to life when light was shot through a tiny hole onto a wall. The desire to make these images brighter and much clearer gave birth to lenses and eventually the movies.
At the permanent exhibit area of the Ghibli Museum, visitors can appreciate the process of how drawings on paper become animated on a roll of film. But the screening of a film simply cannot happen without the lens.
This exhibition allows visitors to experience first-hand these close-by yet unnoticed lenses. While walking through and looking into small viewing booths, visitors can peek through lenses and see how objects in front of their eyes seem to change in shape, size and brightness. It is a wonderful sensation that we hope viewers will enjoy.
Additionally, in the footsteps of those forerunners dedicated to entertain crowds with "the world through lenses", visitors will be able to experience projecting "moving pictures" at an interactive exhibit. Furthermore, visitors will have a chance to screen their own Museum film tickets.
Through this exhibition, we hope that the visitors can re-discover these immediate yet often-forgotten lenses.
【Organizer】 The Tokuma Memorial Cultural Foundation for Animation
【Special Collaboration】 Studio Ghibli Inc.
【Exhibition Period】 June 1, 2013 to May 2014 (tentative)
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Look up at the ceiling, and you will find it covered in fresco painting. In the center of a blue sky, there is a shining, smiling sun. Trees stretching up towards the sky are filled with grapes, melons, deliciously ripe fruits, and beautiful blossoms which you may never have seen before. If you look carefully, you may see Kiki on her broom, Nausicaa on her jet glider, or other characters flying through the sky.
Here is a towering open space extending up through the entire height of the Museum. In the glass dome at its center, a yellow whale swims in the ocean and the blades of a giant fan rotate overhead. Shining marbles of colored glass are fitted into the ironwork of the stairs and handrails. Taking in the whole room from bottom to top, you will discover a maze of spiral stairways, bridged passages, and overhanging terraces. This marvelous space transports you into the world of Hayao Miyazaki and the strange buildings which often appear in his films. Here you can see and feel them for yourself. Please pause before entering the exhibition rooms, and find your own secret favorite spots.
This is one of the five rooms on the first floor called "Where a Film is Born". The room seems to belong to someone who was sketching at the desk just a few minutes ago. The room is filled with books and toys. The walls are all covered with illustrations and sketches. Hanging from the ceiling are a model of an airplane and a model of a Peterandone. It's a place where the owner of the room has stored his favorite things. This room provides lots of inspiration for what will go on to the blank piece of paper on the desk to become the origin of an actual film.
The Saturn Theater is a small theater in the basement of the Museum with only about eighty seats. There you can watch an original short animated feature from Ghibli, which can only be seen in the Museum's theatre. A blue sky and lots of colorful flowers are drawn on the ceiling and walls. When the film ends, the windows open and the sunshine comes in. You can sit on a little red bench or the back of a seat to see the big screen without being blocked.
"TRI HAWKS (a pun on the name of the city "Mi-taka"--literally 3-hawks--where the museum is located)" is the reading room inside the Ghibli Museum. It was created to communicate the Museum's wish to have children see, touch, and feel strange and mysterious things through books.
The Cat Bus is waiting for you in a room on the second floor. It must be everyone's dream to touch and ride the Cat Bus. In order to make this wish come true, we made a room with an actual Cat Bus. If you remember the Cat Bus from "My Neighbor Totoro", you have probably dreamed of touching its fluffy fur. Now you can do it. Next to the Cat Bus, a bunch of soot-black Dust Bunnies are waiting for you to play with them. We wanted to make the Cat Bus as big as it is in the film, but because it wouldn't fit in the museum, we ended up downsizing him a little bit.
From the terrace off the Cat Bus Room, a spiral stairway leads to the roof, and there you will find a grassy rooftop garden. From this lofty post, a serene five-meter-tall Robot Soldier (from “Laputa Castle in the Sky”) looks down on Inokashira Park.