From Monet and Van Gogh to Picasso and Matisse, masterpieces of this genre highlight its continued influence on the Asian art scene, Zhang Kun reports.

While unboxing the painting The Gleize Bridge Over the Vigueirat Canal by Vincent van Gogh in the presence of journalists on Monday, Shanghai Museum East announced the opening of ticket sales for its upcoming exhibition Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art: From Impressionism to Contemporary Art, which will run from Jan 22 to April 21.

The Pola Museum of Art, located in Hakone-machi of the Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan, is home to an exclusive private collection of Western art distinguished by its quality and quantity.

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Its collection was founded by Tsuneshi Suzuki, son of the founder of the Pola Group, a cosmetics company. Suzuki loved painting and Chinese ceramics and began acquiring distinguished collections in the 1960s. He passed away in 2000, two years before the Pola Museum opened.

The upcoming exhibition at Shanghai Museum East is the first time the Pola exhibits its collection in China, and is hailed as "the most ambitious overseas exhibition to date", according to Hiroko Noguchi, director of the Pola Museum.

The 69 paintings selected from the core collection of the Pola Museum encapsulate the pivotal era of the late 19th to mid-20th centuries in Western art history, Noguchi says. They span from seminal works of early French Impressionists such as Claude Monet and Pierre Auguste Renoir and the masterpieces of groundbreaking post-Impressionists such as Paul Cezanne, Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, who were revered as trailblazers by latter-day painters, to the epochal creations of 20th-century masters such as Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque and Henri Matisse.

Although Shanghai Museum has showcased several Impressionist masterpieces in its past exhibitions, this will be the first time the institution presents a comprehensive, systematic and panoramic exhibition of the art form, which, arguably, had the most extensive impact on Chinese and Asian art, says Chu Xiaobo, director of the Shanghai Museum.

Curated by the Shanghai Museum's team, the exhibition will consist of six chapters — the prologue features Realism, the Barbizon School and the Prelude to Impressionism; the second and third chapters Center Stage: The Birth of Impressionism Through its Exhibition and More Brilliance: The Emergence of Neo-Impressionism and Post-Impressionism Showcase will bring together works by some of the most celebrated masters, including six Monet paintings selected out of 19 in the Pola Museum collection.

The fourth chapter Legacy of Light: Modern Art After Impressionism consists of works by Matisse, Picasso and Braque, showing the emergence of Fauvism, Cubism and the colorful Modernism art scene.

The fifth chapter Echoes: Western-style Painting in the East brings together paintings by Asian artists reflecting how they were influenced and inspired by Impressionism.

Aside from works from the Pola Museum's collection, the Shanghai Museum has borrowed artworks from the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, the Anhui Museum and the Liu Haisu Art Museum in Shanghai. These paintings by Liu Haisu, Pan Yuliang and others will be displayed alongside paintings created in the 20th century by Japanese and other Asian artists that show how Western art, art education and artistic ideas influenced Asia's art scene.

The sixth chapter Epilogue: Light and Space in Contemporary Art will be presented at Gallery 3, showing Pola's recent acquisitions of contemporary art, offering insights into the creativity of today's artists through photos, videos and installations, showing the artists' love for nature and their pursuit of more powerful expressions of light and color.

The exhibition marks the fifth installment of "A Dialogue With the World Series" of exhibitions at the Shanghai Museum, Chu says. Compared to past exhibitions of Impressionist art in China that featured artworks from Western institutions such as the Musee Marmottan Monet and the Bemberg Foundation in France, the exhibition at the Shanghai Museum is marked by its distinctive Asian perspective, starting from the rise and development of Impressionism to its continuous influence.

The exhibition will "take audiences on a textbook-style journey through the universal charm of Impressionism and its unique resonance in Asia", says Shen Yubing, a professor at Fudan University.

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Chu says the exhibition will also serve as part of the celebration of the first China-Japan-South Korea Cultural Exchange Year, which will take place in 2025 and 2026.

"About 3 percent of the visitors to the Pola Museum are from China. I hope that we will have more visitors after this exhibition," says Keiko Imai, chief curator of the Pola Museum.

If you go

Masterpieces of the Pola Museum of Art: From Impressionism to Contemporary Art

Jan 22-April 21, 10 am-6 pm (last entry at 5 pm); closed on Tuesdays (except national holidays).

1952 Century Avenue, Pudong New Area, Shanghai.

Individual visitors can enter the Museum with a valid ID through the B1 East Gate (near Dingxiang Road) after security check; while groups reserved can enter through the North Gate (1F, near Century Avenue) after security check.

Contact the writer at zhangkun@chinadaily.com.cn