Case #02: Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art (Bias and Lack of Transparency in the Collection and Exhibition
Overview of the Issue
Collection Policy (Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art)
The museum collects artworks following the three principles.
1. Important works representing the history of contemporary art after the World War II
2. Works indicating the link between contemporary art and Hiroshima
3. Works of promising young artists
Hiromi Tsuchida, Miyako Ishiuchi – Hiroshima Photographic Works / Collection Records at Other Museums
Hiromi Tsuchida, Miyako Ishiuchi – Hiroshima Photography / Publication History of Related Books
Hiromi Tsuchida – Hiroshima Photography History
Hiromi Tsuchida – Major Hiroshima-Related Photobooks:
Hiroshima 1945–1979 (Asahi Sonorama, 1979)
Hiroshima (Kosei Publishing, 1985)
Hiroshima Collection (NHK Publishing, 1995)
Hiroshima Monument II (Toseisha, 1995)
Hiroshima 2005 (NHK Publishing, 2005)
Hiroshima Monument (Fugensha, 2025)
Hiroshima Collection (NHK Publishing, 2025)
>Hiromi Tsuchida's Publications (link)
Miyako Ishiuchi – Hiroshima Photography History:
2007–present: Atomic bomb artifacts (materials housed in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum collection)
Miyako Ishiuchi – Major Hiroshima-Related Photobooks:
Hiroshima (Shueisha, 2008)
From Hiroshima (Kyuryudo, 2014)
Miyako Ishiuchi: Texture and Photography (Kyuryudo, 2017)
Examples of Collections in Japanese Museums (Yokohama Museum of Art, Tokyo Photographic Art Museum)
Yokohama Museum of Art (from Collection Database)
Hiromi Tsuchida: Total 60 works
Hiroshima 1945–1979 / 2005: 20 works
Hiroshima Monument: 20 works
Hiroshima Collection: 20 works
Miyako Ishiuchi: Total 57 works (55 from the Yokosuka series, others)
Hiroshima series: not in collection
Note: Exhibition held in 2017
Tokyo Photographic Art Museum (from Collection Database)Hiromi Tsuchida (First Phase Priority Collection Artist): Total 246 works
Hiroshima 1945–1979: 20 works
Hiroshima Monument: 30 works
Hiroshima Collection: 23 works
Miyako Ishiuchi (Second Phase Priority Collection Artist): Total 33 works
Hiroshima series: 10 works
Hiromi Tsuchida – Collection and Exhibition Records (Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art)
Collection and Exhibition Records at Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art – Hiromi Tsuchida
Only one work held in the museum’s collection: from the Hiroshima Monument series – Dome 1979/1990/2008 (set of three)
Note: Issues in Collection and Exhibition
Problems have been noted in the display of this series, where only the image of the Atomic Bomb Dome is used in a manner inconsistent with the series’ original concept. Additionally, titles extracted directly from the series lose their meaning when works are exhibited individually. Despite these issues, they have been left unaddressed for many years.
Special Exhibitions and Commissioned Works at the Museum
Special Exhibitions and Commissioned Works at the Museum
Special Exhibitions: 0
Solo Exhibitions: 0
Group Exhibitions: 0
Small Exhibitions: 1
Dome: An Artist’s Approach to Its Monument, 2008
Note: No record of this exhibition appears on the museum’s official website
Note: The Hiroshima Collection is treated not as artworks but as related materials, with exhibition history limited to collaborative displays as follows.
Special Exhibition Marie-Ange Guilleminot 2005.7.9(Sat) — 9.25(Sun)
Miyako Ishiuchi – Collection and Exhibition Records (Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art)
Collection and Exhibition Records at Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art – Miyako Ishiuchi
Works in the Museum’s Collection:
(Pending response from the Cultural Promotion Division, Citizens’ Affairs Bureau) XX works – under verification
Estimated: approximately 20–30 works, including Mother’s and Hiroshima series
Special Exhibitions and Commissioned Works:
Special Exhibitions: 3 or more
Solo Exhibitions: 1
Group Exhibitions: 2 or more (to be confirmed)
All include new commissioned works and artist invitations
Small Exhibitions: None
Solo Exhibition:Miyako Ishiuchi: Hiroshima – Strings of Time
Dates: June 28, 2008 (Sat) – August 10, 2008 (Sun)New commissioned works and artist invitation included
Commission amount, contracting party, and number of works acquired: under verification
Group Exhibition:
Part 1: Life = Work – 70th Anniversary of the Atomic Bomb
Dates: July 18, 2015 (Sat) – September 27, 2015 (Sun)Included new commissioned works and artist invitation
Commission amount, contracting party, and number of works acquired: under verification
Group Exhibition:
Renewal Commemoration: Before/After
Dates: March 18, 2023 (Sat) – June 18, 2023 (Sun)Included new commissioned works and artist invitation (new works not related to Hiroshima)
Commission amount, contracting party, and number of works acquired: under verification
Reference: The Before/After exhibition was a renewal commemoration project that commissioned many artists to create new works on the theme of Hiroshima. However, the museum’s sole Tsuchida work, from the Hiroshima Monumentseries, was neither supplemented nor updated and was exhibited in a partially incomplete state under an incorrect title. This effectively diminishes the ongoing, expanding scope of Tsuchida’s Hiroshima work and hampers its relative recognition in Hiroshima—a fact that cannot be overlooked, especially since it is the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art itself that has done so. Moreover, the museum’s artist introduction makes no mention of Tsuchida’s Hiroshima Collection, his representative series that has been in progress since 1982. According to Tsuchida, a few months before the exhibition opened, the museum’s PR staff contacted him requesting to use a single photograph of the Dome for publicity purposes. Tsuchida responded that using only one image was inappropriate given the series’ concept. However, no further communication followed, and it remains unclear whether his intentions were fully understood. This incident suggests a fundamental lack of understanding within the museum regarding both the photographic medium and the conceptual integrity of the series.
Issues in the Exhibition and Collection Policies of the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art
Hiromi Tsuchida’s Hiroshima Monument, part of his Hiroshima Trilogy, is represented in the museum by only a single work, displayed in a manner that diverges from the original concept of the series. His other key series—Children of the A-Bomb (Hibakusha) and Hiroshima Collection (A-Bomb Artifacts)—have no history of exhibition as artworks, and neither research nor collection efforts have been undertaken for them.
By contrast, the standard practice in other museums is to collect multiple works from each series in accordance with the trilogy’s core concept. The museum’s collection policy therefore represents a significant deviation from this standard. This cannot simply be attributed to curatorial staff’s basic lack of photographic knowledge. The Children of the A-Bomb (Hibakusha) series, in particular, has a substantial record of exhibition and acquisition in both domestic and international museums and is arguably of critical importance to Hiroshima, yet it has never been treated as a research subject by the museum. Survivors themselves have questioned why these works cannot be seen in Hiroshima.
Tsuchida’s Hiroshima Monument and Hiroshima Collection have been exhibited and collected by major international museums, including Tate Modern, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and European photography museums, and have been highly regarded in international art events such as the Yokohama Triennale and Carnegie International. These accomplishments demonstrate the series’ significance not only within photography but also within contemporary art more broadly. Furthermore, in 2025, the large-scale exhibition of the Hiroshima Collection at the Nakanoshima Kosetsu Museum of Art (Osaka), commemorating the 80th anniversary of the bombing, received extensive media coverage, highlighting Tsuchida’s 55-year engagement with Hiroshima. During this exhibition, questions were raised in multiple forums regarding the fact that the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art neither exhibited nor collected this series.
It has been reported that the museum had an internal guideline limiting an artist’s participation in special exhibitions to a single occasion, with multiple participations allowed only under exceptional circumstances (according to testimony from a former curator). However, Miyako Ishiuchi exceeded this principle, participating in at least three special exhibitions organized by the same curator. Moreover, all of these appearances likely involved significant budgets for new commissioned works and artist invitations, with production commissions and acquisitions conducted integrally—a practice highly unusual for the museum’s general commissioning system (details under verification).
This raises the possibility that personal relationships between the responsible curator, the artist, and the gallery may have exerted considerable influence over the museum’s selection of artists and works. Considering the track record and domestic and international recognition of both Tsuchida’s and Ishiuchi’s Hiroshima-related activities, it is difficult to conclude that the museum ensured transparency and fairness in its exhibition and acquisition decisions, despite its stated mission to broadly represent diverse expressions of Hiroshima.
Multiple testimonies also indicate that a specific curator with a close relationship to Ishiuchi, possibly motivated by past personal friction with Tsuchida—when Tsuchida had criticized the curator’s lack of photographic historical knowledge—intentionally excluded Tsuchida’s works and exhibition proposals, thereby undermining the artist and the value of his works. This curator’s personal influence appears to have strongly shaped the museum’s exhibition and collection policies.
Testimony: According to several individuals who formerly worked at the museum as curators or interns, the curatorial department was pervaded by a dictatorship led by the department head and a senior curator. For example, in the 2010s, a young curator who joined the department was subjected to prolonged collective harassment. Despite clear abusive actions by the department head and others, she was forced to resign voluntarily under the pretext of personal responsibility. A gag order was effectively imposed on those around her, and her legitimate complaints and the facts of the case were suppressed through false reports by the department head. This incident clearly illustrates an organizational culture in which curators have lost any self-regulating function, allowing them to exclude artists they dislike and favor only those with whom they are personally close.
Regarding the Hiroshima Prize (under investigation)
Testimony: It has been confirmed that a curator who has had a long-standing close relationship with Miyako Ishiuchi, the day after receiving lavish entertainment from Ishiuchi and her gallery, made multiple statements during a conversation within the curatorial department such as, “Yesterday I was made to drink an incredibly expensive wine by Ishiuchi. She really wants the Hiroshima Prize (to hold her second solo exhibition). We have to somehow make sure she wins.” It has also been verified that this curator nominated Ishiuchi for the Hiroshima Prize multiple times.