Guimet – musée national des arts asiatiques presents the exhibition Haikus d’argent, L’Asie photographiée by Michael Kenna. Museum President Yannick Lintz writes:
The exhibition Haikus d’argent, L’Asie photographiée par Michael Kenna is a major event in the Guimet Museum’s rich program devoted to photography. Following several notable exhibitions, such as the superb monograph Marc Riboud. Histoires possibles, in 2021, or Portrait éphémère du Japon. Photographies de Pierre-Élie de Pibrac in 2023, it highlights the prominent place that Asia has held in Michael Kenna’s work for forty years, revealing the singularity, sensitivity, and finesse of his view of the landscapes of this magnificent continent. This generous art has itself been the object of an exceptional generosity, since on November 10, 2022, Michael Kenna donated his entire photographic oeuvre to France. Since then, 4,000 original prints have joined the collections preserved by the Médiathèque du patrimoine et de la photographie. Ultimately, more than 180,000 negatives, accompanied by their contact sheets, nearly 8,000 working prints and all the archives linked to Michael Kenna’s artistic activity over the past half century will enrich the national collections. A British and American citizen living in the United States, Michael Kenna thus expresses through a remarkable gesture his affection for our country, which he has so often traveled and photographed, and his confidence in our heritage institutions.
Photography’s role in the French cultural landscape has continued to grow over the years, and the Guimet Museum makes a valuable contribution through its publications, exhibitions, and acquisitions. The museum’s photographic collections, built up since its foundation by Émile Guimet in 1879, continue to grow: they include nearly 600,000 photographs taken in Asia from the introduction of the technology in the mid-19th century to contemporary production. The brand new Villa Guimet, an international research center on Asian arts created at the end of 2024 by the Guimet Museum, aims to continue and develop the important work of inventorying, cataloguing, preserving, restoring, and promoting this exceptional heritage.
As the bicentennial of photography approaches, which will be officially celebrated in France from September 2026 to September 2027, I am delighted to be able to pay tribute to both the immense talent of Michael Kenna and the fascinating continent of Asia.
Yannick Lintz
President of Guimet – musée national des arts asiatiques
Haikus d’argent, L’Asie photographiée par Michael Kenna
Until September 29, 2025
Guimet – musée national des arts asiatiques
6 Pl. d’Iéna
75116 Paris, France
www.guimet.fr
