- Art & Culture
ASAKO HISHIKI. Wandering Soul
ASAKO HISHIKI. Wandering Soul たましいの散歩
TamashiinoSanpo,
a journey into identity and transformation
From May 16 to June 21, 2026 the Palazzo dei Principi – Pinacoteca Don Primo Mazzolari in Bozzolo (MN) the solo exhibition by Japanese artist Asako Hishiki, curated by Matteo Galbiati and Raffaella Nobili, titled Anima Errante たましいの散歩 Tamashii no Sanpo, as the result of the Audience Award awarded as part of the art exhibition Rethinking Space and Time. 16th City of Bozzolo Award – 10th Don Primo Mazzolari Biennial, 2023 edition.
The exhibition project, promoted by the Municipality of Bozzolo in collaboration with the Don Primo Mazzolari Foundation, was born from the recognition that the artist’s work possesses a linguistic coherence and conceptual depth capable of uniting tradition and contemporaneity in a unified vision. It has received the high patronage of the Consulate General of Japan in Milan and is an official event of the 160th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and Italy. It also enjoys the patronage of the Province of Mantua, the SantaGiulia Academy of Fine Arts in Brescia, the Friends of Palazzo Te and the Mantua Museums, GAL Oglio-Po, Le Regge dei Gonzaga Cultural District, the Municipality of Pagliara, SMart APS.
The title Anima Errante immediately introduces the theoretical core of the exhibition, recalling the famous invocation attributed to Emperor Hadrian*, in which the soul is evoked as a fragile and transitory presence, aware of its own instability; however, in this context, this image is stripped of its elegiac dimension to assume a structural function, becoming an active principle of passage, a dynamic condition from which identity is constructed through movement and transformation. From this perspective, this solo exhibition, with an anthological approach, takes the form of a complex experiential device, built around the idea of identity in motion, in which the exhibition itinerary, unfolding across seven spaces (each distinguished by its own title and specific identity), does not present itself as a sequence of autonomous spaces, but as a relational system in which each passage alters the perception of the previous one and prepares the next, generating a continuity founded on transformation and resonance.
In this context, the structure does not follow a linear narrative but is based on a logic of progressive variation, in which returns and shifts become constitutive elements of meaning, and it is precisely here that the figure of the swallow takes on a central role, not as a decorative element but as the organizing principle of the entire project, whose cyclical movement, marked by departures and returns, visually translates a form of identity defined by transit rather than stability. Following this trajectory, the exhibition gradually introduces perceptual and conceptual variations that traverse the themes of travel, light, water, the nocturnal dimension, and the cyclical time of the seasons, ultimately leading the visitor to a reflection on origin that does not coincide with a nostalgic return, but with a conscious reactivation. In this sense, Japan, made explicit in the final phase of the exhibition, emerges as an active cultural matrix—not as a place from which one departs, but as an imaginative threshold that exerts an attraction in the present, determining a circular configuration of the entire exhibition layout in which the point of arrival coincides with a new possibility of beginning.
Within this framework, Asako Hishiki’s artistic practice reveals itself as a process of stratification developed across different geographical and cultural contexts, in which her formation between Japan and Italy translates into a language that does not seek a simplified synthesis, but constructs a dynamic balance between visual systems and heterogeneous sensibilities. Particularly significant in this sense is the reinterpretation of the traditional technique of mokuhanga 木版画, (traditional Japanese woodblock printing) employed here in dialogue with contemporary materials and media, in a process that, not limited to formal recovery, implies an active transformation of the language, verified and redefined in the current context.
The result is an artistic practice in which gesture, material, and time take on a central role, giving shape to images that, never exhausted in their visual dimension, emerge as the outcomes of a process of transition and sedimentation; and precisely for this reason, Anima Errante たましいの散歩 Tamashii no Sanpo presents itself as a project that does not offer a simple vision, but constructs an experience, inviting the visitor to engage with a perceptual and temporal dimension in which identity and memory are defined through continuous change.
The texts for the seven sections, displayed in the exhibition and published in the monograph as a critical introduction to the corresponding chapters of the Japanese artist’s history, were written by Alessia Bellini, Elena Magnisi, Sofia Mambrini, Laura Rusconi, Annachiara Spelta, and Chiara Tabarelli, students of the Course in Art Education (Prof. Matteo Galbiati) of the Two-Year Specialization in Communication and Art Education at the SantaGiulia Academy of Fine Arts in Brescia.
To mark the exhibition, a bilingual Italian-English book has been published—the first true anthological monograph—summarizing Asako Hishiki’s twenty years of research. Published by Vanillaedizioni, it contains a rich iconographic repertoire, a critical essay by Matteo Galbiati and Raffaella Nobili, the texts of the sections, and an updated bio-bibliographical appendix.
Wandering Soul たましいの散歩 Tamashii no Sanpo
OPENING May 16, 2026
5:00 PM Opening
6:00 PM Opening concert “Anime consonanti” featuring Japanese folk music and excerpts from European operas curated by “Colere Anima” and featuring Aira Hara (soprano) and Noriaki Yamamura (baritone)
Dates: May 17 – June 21, 2026
Hours: Daily 3:30–6:00 PM
Friday and Saturday 10:00 AM–12:00 PM and 3:30–6:00 PM
Closed June 2
Free admissionWORKSHOPS June 13, 2026
11:00 AM–1:00 PM Form and Color with Kanaco Takahashi
2:00 PM–4:00 PM Mokuhanga. Printing trials on greeting cards with Asako Hishiki
Guided tours, educational tours, and participation in educational workshops by reservation at the Library (a contribution of €30 per person is required for workshops to cover expenses – for Andon, paper lamp, the maximum is 7 participants).
INFO
Municipality of Bozzolo: +39 0376 910826 segreteriadue@comune.bozzolo.mn.it
Mazzolari Foundation: +39 0376 920726 fondazionemazzolari.premioarte@gmail.com
Mario Miglioli Municipal Library: +39 0376 233124 biblioteca@comune.bozzolo.mn.it
Japanese Screens – Nobili Gallery: info@paraventigiapponesi.it
