Mapmaker, mapmaker, make me a map

03-26-04_image-1_thumb.jpg

Tucked in a corner of the Smart Museum, a spare collection of scrolls, prints, and sepia-toned photographs comprise Mapping the Sacred: Nineteenth-Century Japanese Shinto Prints. Gathered principally by Edmund Burke, a Chicago comparative-religion professor, during his 1890s travels, the images portray both a change in the way artists rendered three-dimensional spaces flat (introducing Western-style perspective, photography, and printing advances) and the influences of increased tourism.

Displayed through Sunday in the Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery, the exhibit was curated by Kris Ercums, an art history Ph.D. candidate.

A.L.M.

Photo: "The Daidai Kagura Shinto Dance at Ise Shrine," 1890, lithograph mounted as hanging scroll.

March 26, 2004