2026-27 International Lecture Series / Noriko Murai Cross-Cultural Currents: Water in 19th-Century Japanese, French, and American Art

Description

Noriko Murai, PhD, Professor of Art History in the Faculty of Liberal Arts and the Graduate Program in Global Studies at Sophia University, Tokyo, Japan From Hokusai’s churning Great Wave to Monet’s serene Water Lilies and Homer’s dramatic seascapes, water emerged as a defining motif of the modern era. In the late nineteenth century, the rise of steamships suddenly connected distant worlds at unprecedented speeds, launching a new age of global travel between hubs like Yokohama, London, and New York. In this lecture, Dr. Noriko Murai explores the ocean as both a literal highway for cross-cultural exchange and a profound artistic symbol, examining how nineteenth-century artists captured water’s volatile, ever-changing fluidity as a mirror for a rapidly shifting modern world. Murai received her PhD from Harvard University and is Professor of Art History in the Faculty of Liberal Arts and the Graduate School of Global Studies at Sophia University, Tokyo, where she teaches the history of modern art with a focus on Japan and Japonisme. Her research interests include cross-cultural exchanges, art historiography, and women’s participation in the arts. A bilingual scholar working in Japanese and English, her publications in English include Journeys East: Isabella Stewart Gardner and Asia (2009), Inventing Asia: American Perspectives Around 1900 (2014), Japan in the Heisei Era (1989–2019): Multidisciplinary Perspectives (2022), and Japan and Japonisme: The Self and the Other in Representations of Japanese Culture (2025).