From 26 June to 20 September 2026, the Kupferstich-Kabinett of the Dresden State Art Collections presents Japan on Paper in Dresden. Utamaro, Hokusai, Hiroshige and the Graphic Arts of Modernism, an exhibition dedicated to the refined world of Japanese woodblock prints and their lasting influence on international modern art.
Supported by A. Lange & Söhne as part of its long-standing partnership with the Dresden State Art Collections, established in 2006, the exhibition brings together masterpieces by some of the most celebrated Japanese artists of the 18th and 19th centuries, including Kitagawa Utamaro, Katsushika Hokusai and Utagawa Hiroshige. The works on display are drawn from a remarkable collection of more than 10,000 items, with several pieces being shown to the public for the first time.
The exhibition also retraces Dresden’s historic fascination with Japanese art, a connection that dates back to the era of Augustus the Strong. Around 1900, the city became one of the first German centres of Japonism, a cultural movement that deeply influenced the European art scene. During this period, expanding the museum’s collection of international modern art, particularly Japanese works, became a key priority. The approximately 300 Japanese woodblock prints and books acquired at the time remain among the most significant parts of the collection today.
Alongside the Japanese prints, visitors will encounter around 40 works by artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Edvard Munch, James McNeill Whistler, Mary Cassatt and Emil Orlik. This dialogue between Eastern and Western visual languages reveals how Japanese aesthetics — from delicate lines and distinctive colour palettes to an extraordinary attention to detail — helped shape the artistic vocabulary of modernism.
For A. Lange & Söhne, supporting the exhibition is also a tribute to craftsmanship, precision and cultural exchange. The Saxon watch manufacture recognises in Japanese art a shared devotion to detail, beauty and technical excellence — values that have long defined its own approach to watchmaking.
