The plain face, flanked on both sides by colorful faces, seemed to be hunched over

Plain Face sandwiched between colorful faces — Colorful faces drawn by Izumi Kato

As the name suggests, the Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum in Meguro has a garden as well, and its main feature is an old western-style building. This western-style house was built in 1933 as the residence of Prince Yasuhiko Asaka. The Asakamiya family is now defunct, but it existed before the war. Prince Yasuhiko Asaka was the great uncle of Emperor Akihito.

Despite the simple exterior with almost no ornamentation, the interior of the Western-style building was decorated in the Art Deco style that was popular in France at the time. It is said that Prince Yasuhiko Asaka, who had studied in France, was fascinated by the beauty of the style, and when he returned to Japan, he commissioned the French artist Henri Lapin to design the house, and incorporated the essence of Art Deco into the house. That elegant space is now a museum.

At this time, works by contemporary artists were on display. In the Art Deco decorated space, there were contemporary art works on display. It was like a different martial arts match. Even the Greek mythological figures on the wallpaper were surprised to see both sides of them. The colorful physiognomy of Izumi Kato's work may not seem like the same humanity to the Greek mythological figures.

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