In the first of eight rooms inside of the Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition in Tokyo, photos are projected onto everyday objects to give them life. (Jonathan Baez/Stars and Stripes)
The Gyuki, a spider-like yokai, or Japanese demon, moves along the wall.
With a bovine head and a reputation for brutal, poisonous attacks, it is one of the various demons and spirit monsters you will encounter at the Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition in Tokyo.
There’s still time to catch the exhibit at the Warehouse Terrada in the Shinagawa section of the city before it closes on June 28.
Walk through dimly lit rooms where three-dimensional computer graphics to bring the yokai and other objects to life. Read about the history of Japanese folklore and the artists who were inspired by it.
The Yokai Immersive Experience is the world’s first immersive digital art museum and features eight rooms. It is a physical and digital art experience designed for both children and adults that takes about an hour to walk through.
Projections of water and spirits dance on the walls at the Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition in Tokyo. (Jonathan Baez/Stars and Stripes)
The galleries display art from the Edo and Meiji periods and explore the origins of yokai and what natural phenomena, floods, disease and unexplained deaths drove ordinary people to imagine the nightmare-fueling monsters that would haunt future generations to come.
Drowning deaths near rivers gave rise to the kappa. Plague and disaster took the shape of the oni.
The exhibition features works by Ukiyo-e masters like Utagawa Kuniyoshi, an Edo-period artist. Ukiyo-e, or “floating world,” artists rendered their work primarily on woodblock prints.
In the final room of the Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition in Tokyo, the yokai come to life and zoom across the walls. (Jonathan Baez/Stars and Stripes)
Yokai became one of its most popular subjects. People of that era, which ended in 1868, had an appetite for the supernatural, and artists competed to produce the most vivid, imaginative monster imagery they could.
Not all yokai projections in the exhibit induce fear. In a standout section, a sea of blue surrounds the room as beautifully rendered, two-dimensional water spirits zoom across projected water, drifting between different natural landscapes of Japan.
Linger in the projection rooms as the art moves around the walls, or jump into the interactive installations. Either way, there is something for everyone to enjoy.
Wisteria hangs in a room inside the Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition in Tokyo. Wisteria has a power in Japanese folklore to repel yokai and evil spirits. (Jonathan Baez/Stars and Stripes)
On the QT
Directions: From Tennozu Isle Station’s A exit, walk north on the sidewalk, then head west when you hit the intersection. The Warehouse Terrada building will be on the left. Signs indicate the exhibit entrance. Google plus code: JPCX+CF Shinagawa City, Tokyo
Times: 9:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday until June 28.
Costs: 2,600 yen for adults; 1,800 yen for high school students and older; 800 yen for children and middle school students. Tickets at the experience’s entrance are cash only, but online tickets are also available on the official website.
Food: You’ll find plenty of options near Warehouse Terrada.
Information: Online: www.yokaiimmersive.com/en
AloJapan.com