Things to do in Tokyo today

This autumn, 13 artists are coming together at Tennozu’s What Cafe to showcase and sell works that reinterpret Japanese traditional culture, techniques and materials through contemporary artistic perspectives. The centrepiece of the exhibition is Ontakkyu, a collaborative installation created by guest artists in partnership with Miyamoto Unosuke Shoten. Offering a playful new interpretation of traditional Japanese matsuri festivals, the work reimagines table tennis, traditionally enjoyed as a sport, as a fictional Shinto ritual. Tables, rackets and balls are transformed from sporting equipment into ceremonial objects, with the installation also featuring a space designed for this imaginary festival. Founded in 1861, Miyamoto Unosuke Shoten has spent more than 160 years manufacturing and selling traditional festival equipment, including portable mikoshi shrines, taiko drums, massive dashi floats and lion dance costumes. For this exhibition, the company joins forces with the participating artists to explore Japanese traditions, craftsmanship and materials through fresh interpretations. Once you’ve had your fill of art, settle in with a coffee or lunch, as What Cafe offers a selection of caffeinated drinks and meals in a relaxed, artful atmosphere. It’s a great spot to discover Tokyo’s grassroots art scene while taking a break – or even buying a piece for yourself.

Showa Kinen Park is the most beautiful in autumn, with the maple and ginkgo trees blushing in fiery red and yellow respectively. The ginkgo trees are the first to turn and you can see one of the two boulevards of golden yellow trees as soon as you enter the park’s Tachikawa gate. These trees are expected to turn full yellow in mid-November. The momiji and kaede trees, however, present their signature vermillion hues a bit later towards the end of November. During this season, the park stays open after dark, with special light-ups taking place at the Katarai no Icho Namiki Ginkgo Tree Avenue (near the futsal and basketball courts), the canal ginkgo avenue by the Tachikawa park entrance and the traditional Japanese Garden from 4.30pm until 8.30pm. While you can enjoy the light-ups at Ginkgo Tree Avenue with just the park's regular admission fee (¥450, free for junior high school students and younger), you need an extra ticket to enter the Japanese Garden for the evening light-up (advance ticket online ¥1,200, primary and junior high school students ¥600; same-day tickets sold at Komorebi House (cash-only) close to the Japanese Garden ¥1,300, ¥700). Tickets to enter the Japanese Garden are available for purchase online from October 22, including park admission and Japanese Garden bundle pass for a discounted price of ¥1,600 (¥600). Admission into the Japanese Garden is waived on October 29 and 30.

With its 300 to 700 vendors, this is by far Tokyo’s biggest flea market and it takes place nearly every weekend in the parking lot of Oi Racecourse, also known as Tokyo City Keiba. With an extensive selection of goods, it’s not difficult to spend half a day here – and given the tempting prices, you definitely won’t leave empty-handed. Expect to find daily necessities, rare collector’s items, clothing, accessories, handmade goods, home décor, toys and even a small selection of antiques. And since shopping can be quite tiring, hungry bargain hunters can restore their energy levels by munching on light meals and snacks from food trucks on-site. Do note that the market will be cancelled in the case of rain. Check the event Instagram for the latest updates.

Neuro-tech startup VIE is bringing its masterful soundscape engineering to Tokyo National Museum for the first time with Zen Night Tokyo, an event taking place in the gardens behind the main museum building from October 14 to December 6. Held to coincide with the upcoming ‘Daitoku-ji: Japan’s Unrivalled Zen Monastery – 700th Anniversary Special Exhibition', the Japanese garden is hosting this special after-hours autumn leaves illumination spectacle designed to soothe the senses and let visitors admire the natural beauty of the grounds, which are ordinarily closed to the public. Themed around the Buddhist concepts of rebirth and cyclical existence, this immersive journey guides visitors through different areas along the mirror-like Suigetsu pond, including an open-air teahouse zone where you can enter different realms through soundscapes tuned to distinct wavelengths, each designed to evoke a unique emotional experience. Continuing along the pond, visitors discover a path of spider lilies, flowers often associated with the arrival of autumn and the honouring of ancestral spirits. Aptly named Hyakki Yado (Night Path of One Hundred Demons), the path is lined with some 3,000 hauntingly beautiful spider lilies illuminated against the night. Meanwhile, at the Kujokan teahouse, you can drink matcha while admiring the breathtaking illuminated rock garden. The tea experience is paired with a high-tech ‘Brainwave Zen’ meditation experience, which involves measuring brainwaves with...

The 400m-long Keyakizaka Street next to the Roppongi Hills shopping centre is lighting up with 930,000 sparkling white and blue LEDs until Christmas Day. From the pedestrian bridge near the Roppongi Hills Arena, you'll get a stunning view of the trees covered in shimmering lights, with Tokyo Tower in the background, from 5pm to 11pm daily. 

The force behind smash-hit titles including Chainsaw Man and Jujutsu Kaisen, Japanese animation studio Mappa is celebrating its 15th anniversary this year. To mark the milestone, the company is hosting its largest-ever exhibition from September 16, bringing together work from 23 titles at the newly opened Yurakucho Museum. The exhibition features original drawings, large-scale sets and video projections that immerse visitors in the worlds of Mappa shows and films such as Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, Attack on Titan: Final Season, Jujutsu Kaisen and more. At the Chainsaw Man exhibition area, you can feast your eyes on exclusive production materials, including drawings that follow the story of The Movie: Reze Arc, from Denji and Reze’s first encounter and the explosive battle between Chainsaw Man and Bomb to the conclusion of their story. Don’t miss the illuminated life-size figure of Bomb, which is being unveiled for the first time. The Attack on Titan: Final Season zone features original drawings for key scenes, displays explaining the production process, and original hand-drawn watercolour artwork of the symbolic hill from the story’s ending. The Jujutsu Kaisen area revisits some of the series’ most iconic battle scenes and memorable moments. Production materials are exhibited in the first half of this zone, including original drawings from Season 1 and Jujutsu Kaisen 0, while the second half features materials from Season 2, Hidden Inventory / Premature Death,...

Tokyo itself becomes both subject and stage in Tokyo Atlas, a new international art exhibition unfolding across the capital’s waterfront from October 10 to December 20. The ambitious project transforms parks, public spaces and urban infrastructure into an open-air cultural landscape, inviting attendees to rediscover the city through encounters with site-specific works. Drawing on the dual meaning of its title – both the mythological Atlas and an atlas of maps – the exhibition encourages audiences to navigate Tokyo as a living constellation of artistic discoveries. Anchored by major venues including Daiba Park and the Aomi Minami Port Park area, the exhibition explores how history, geography and global exchange continue to shape the metropolis. Daiba Park, originally constructed as an Edo-period (1603–1868) coastal battery, provides a striking backdrop where contemporary art meets one of the symbolic gateways to Japan’s modernisation. Nearby, the working waterfront of Aomi becomes a setting for projects that reflect on community, ecology and coexistence. French artist Abraham Poincheval presents La Bouteille, a performance in which he inhabits a giant bottle, while the collaborative initiative Goat’s Eyes transforms the site into a participatory environment examining sustainable creativity and new forms of collective living. Elsewhere, the atrium of the Telecom Center Building hosts a landmark installation by the recently passed Yayoi Kusama, bringing together her...

Tokyo Node presents the largest solo exhibition to date by Japanese artist and art director Yoshirotten. Widely recognised for his ability to move seamlessly between fine art, graphic design, moving image, spatial design and commercial projects, the Tokyo-based visionary has spent more than two decades developing a distinctive visual language that bridges urban culture, technology, nature and the cosmos. From collaborations with global brands and musicians to ambitious independent art projects, his work consistently seeks to make the invisible visible. ‘Transmissions with the Beyond’ brings together the artist’s major ongoing series, while introducing new large-scale, site-specific installations. Across these works, Yoshirotten explores enduring themes that have shaped his practice: light, colour, natural phenomena, planetary systems and humanity’s relationship to the unknown. A highlight of the display is a new project created in collaboration with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, which transforms space-related data into immersive visual experiences. Expanding upon the speculative and sci-fi-inspired worldview that has characterised Yoshirotten’s recent work, the exhibition invites visitors to contemplate perspectives that extend beyond the boundaries of everyday perception – and even beyond Earth itself. Serving both as a retrospective of key developments in Yoshirotten’s career and as a platform for new experimentation, the exhibition marks a major milestone for...

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government No 1 Building in Shinjuku serves as the backdrop for a jaw-dropping and record-breaking projection mapping show. Covering an area of a whopping 13,905sqm, the after-dark spectacle has been certified by Guinness World Records as the largest permanent display of its kind in the world. The nightly showcase features a range of visual wonders created by a mix of local and international artists. Some shows are inspired by Tokyo’s rich history, while others draw on themes like the lunar cycle.  Currently, on weeknights, you can catch striking visuals synchronised to ‘800’ and 'Zankyosanka' by hit Japanese pop singer and lyricist Aimer as well as ‘Pac-Man eats Tokyo’, ‘Lunar Cycle’, ‘Synergy’, ‘Tokyo Resonance’ and ‘Evolution’. On weekends, you can look forward to the aforementioned ‘Zankyosanka (Aimer)’, as well as ‘Godzilla: Attack on Tokyo’ and ‘TYO337’, a display featuring motifs of traditional Japanese performing arts such as Kabuki paired with electronic beats.  From March 20, Pokémon Trading Card Game ‘Tokyo Luminous Night’, a brand-new projection-mapping show featuring Pokémon cards on a massive scale, has been running on weekends and holidays from 6.30pm, 7.30pm and 9pm. Be sure to check the event website for more details. Shows take place every night at fifteen-minute intervals from 6pm (Mar from 6.30pm, 7pm from Apr, 7.30pm from May to Aug) to 9.45pm. For more details and to check the full programme of daily projection mapping shows,...

The erotic art of old Edo returns to modern Tokyo’s most seductive ’hood with ‘Kunisada & Kuniyoshi: Shinjuku Kabukicho Shunga Exhibition – WA’. The fourth instalment in a series of exhibitions focused on Shunga, or traditional Japanese erotica, and organised by the Kabukicho-based Smappa! Group, the display showcases original ukiyo-e prints by two of the greatest masters of the form: Utagawa Kunisada and Utagawa Kuniyoshi. Kunisada (1786-1864) is particularly renowned for depicting kabuki actors (yakusha-e) and beautiful women (bijin-ga). What’s more, his pieces are famed for their detailed portrayals of daily life in Edo, and have proved invaluable for historians researching the folksier aspects of the late feudal period. Kuniyoshi (1798-1861), meanwhile, was dubbed ‘Edo’s ultimate graphic designer’. He illustrated the trending topics of his day – from political scandals and sexual fashions to mythical monsters – with a wit and humour that endeared him to the capital’s masses. Curated from the collection of Mitsuru Uragami, one of Japan’s foremost ukiyo-e authorities and Shunga connoisseurs, the exhibition extends throughout the Shinjuku Kabukicho Noh Stage, incorporating bijin-ga, yakusha-e, musha-e (pictures of warriors) and illustrated books in addition to the erotica. Yasutaka Hayashi from artist collective Chim↑Pom from Smappa! Group returns as art director, bringing a hefty serving of Kabukicho flair to the table. Advance tickets are available now via TimeOutShop....