More and more museums are offering to purchase time- and date-specific tickets online. The Tokyo Museum Grutto Pass 2022, which has marked its 20th anniversary, has launched an electronic ticket version in fiscal 2022 that can be purchased via smartphones.

We wanted to enjoy the unique collections of each museum, so we decided to tour the recently reopened Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo, the nearby Okura Museum of Art, and Kumagai Morikazu Museum of Art, which was newly participated in fiscal 2022, by using the Grutto Pass.

The electronic ticket version can be purchased from a personal computer or smartphone. So, access the Grutto Pass website (https://www.rekibun.or.jp/en/grutto/) and select “Buy an e-ticket.” To purchase the e-ticket, you must register as a member on the “Webket” ticket sales site. (The Webket page is available only in the Japanese language.) You can purchase the Grutto Pass regardless of time or location.

The website lists 101 facilities in seven areas and allows visitors to check whether the users can use their Grutto Pass as an admission or discount ticket to their facilities of interest. The area map also shows the location of facilities with icons for five different genres, such as art museums, general museums, and zoos, and provides the distance between facilities and the route from the nearest station.

Our first stop was the Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo, which reopened after renovation in March 2022. It is a three-minute walk from Roppongi-itchome subway station. The museum opened in 2002 on the site of the former Azabu villa of the Sumitomo family in a corner of Izumi Garden, a redevelopment district lined with office buildings and high-rise residences.

Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo allows admission to exhibitions with a Grutto Pass only, although it costs 1,000 yen for adults and 1,200 yen for special exhibitions.
At the museum’s reception desk, I quickly displayed the QR code of the electronic ticket version of the Grutto Pass that I had purchased on my smartphone and had it scanned with the facility’s dedicated terminal for admission.

The Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum houses a collection of approximately 3,500 items (including two national treasures, 19 important cultural properties, and 60 important art objects) of bronze ware, Japanese and Chinese calligraphy, and modern paintings, collected mainly by the 15th head of the Sumitomo family, Sumitomo Kichizaemon Tomoito (pseudonym: Shunsui), in a museum in Kyoto and another in Tokyo.
On the day I visited the museum, Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo Reopening Commemorative Exhibition I: Nihonga of the Three Capitals—Osaka, Kyoto, and Tokyo (March 19 – May 8, 2022) was being held.

The reopening commemorative exhibition (March 19 - October 23, 2022) was held over three phases, offering a wide variety of nihonga and modern Western-style paintings and antiques (Chinese bronzes) from the Sumitomo Collection.

The exhibition consisted of works by painters who were active in the three cities of Osaka, Kyoto, and Tokyo from the Sumitomo family’s collection of Japanese-style paintings. The works revealed the differences in local color among the three cities: Osaka, where individual activities were prominent; Kyoto, where sketching was emphasized; and Tokyo, where tradition and innovation confronted each other.

After taking a break at the café, it’s off to the next museum. This Roppongi neighborhood is home to many art museums and gallery facilities. My next destination, the Okura Museum of Art, is a four-minute walk from the Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo.
Designed by Chuta Ito, one of Japan’s leading architects of the modern era, the classical Chinese-style building was completed in 1927 and is designated as a registered tangible cultural property of Japan.
Here, too, I was able to enter the exhibition by simply displaying the QR code on the Grutto Pass. Without the pass, admission would have been 1,000 yen per adult.

The exhibition, “Hitono sugata, hitono omoi—shuzohin ni miru hitobito no monogatari” (image of people, thoughts of people: stories of people in the museum collection) (April 5 - May 29, 2022), featured paintings reflecting people’s activities at court, annual events, livelihoods, and recreation, as well as waka poems that convey their thoughts to the next generation. The Important Cultural Property Kamo Horse Racing and Uji Tea Picking, by Kusumi Morikage, vividly depicts people passing by on the street and spectators watching a horse race.

The Okura Museum of Art was the first private art museum in Japan managed by an incorporated foundation established by businessman Kihachiro Okura in 1917. Concerned about the loss of valuable Japanese art works to foreign countries after the Meiji Restoration, he set out to collect and protect them and opened the museum to make these cultural assets widely available to the public. The museum currently houses approximately 2,500 works of art (three National Treasures, 13 Important Cultural Properties, and 44 Important Art Objects), mainly from Japan and other parts of Asia.
In the exhibition rooms on the first and second floors, themed exhibitions and special exhibitions are held from an extensive collection of Japanese and other Asian classical works collected mainly by Kihachiro and modern Japanese paintings collected by his eldest son, Kishichiro.

Within walking distance of the two museums, I visited this time, Okura Museum of Art and Sen-Oku Hakukokan Museum Tokyo, there is also Musée Tomo, a facility participating in the Grutto Pass, making it possible to make plans to visit all three museums during the exhibition periods.

From the Okura Museum of Art, I walked for about 10 minutes to Tameike-sanno subway station and then took the subway to Sengawa station.
The third museum I visited was the Kumagai Morikazu Museum of Art in Toshima-ku, which became a participating facility of the Grutto Pass in 2022.
Morikazu Kumagai (1880-1977) was an oil painter active from the Meiji to Showa eras, who painted familiar animals and plants with clear lines and colors. The museum was opened as a private museum by his second daughter, Kaya Kumagai, a painter, on the site of his former residence where he spent the last 45 years of his life. The museum has been managed by the Toshima-ku government since 2007.

A special exhibition, “The 37th Anniversary of the Kumagai Morikazu Museum of Art” (April 12-July 3, 2022) was 700 yen for adults, but the admission was covered by the Grutto Pass.

This special exhibition is held every year around May 28, the anniversary of the museum’s opening. The exhibition attracts many fans during this time of the year, as many of the oil paintings are on display, including those from the collection of the Kumagai Morikazu Tsukechi Memorial of Art in Nakatsugawa, Gifu Prefecture, Morikazu’s hometown. The block-like walls lined with works depicting small creatures and plants seemed to relive Morikazu’s keen eyes as he gazed out over his garden.

Usually, the first and second floors are permanent exhibition rooms. The third floor is a gallery where special exhibitions and solo shows by contemporary artists are held. When I visited, Morikazu’s favorite painting materials and other items were displayed in the gallery on the third floor. The life of Morikazu was also introduced in photographs on the staircase wall.

The three museums I visited this time are facilities that can be entered only with the Grutto Pass. The total admission fee was 2,700 yen, and I was able to get my money’s worth in one day! Since everything from purchase to use and management can be completed with a single smartphone, it can be used on the go whenever I like.

In addition to art galleries and museums, participating facilities of the Grutto Pass include zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens, and gardens. You can make plans based on a variety of themes, such as, “Feel the seasons through paintings and gardens,” or, “Visit museums along the rail line.”
By using the Grutto Pass, you can enjoy art at a reasonable price over a two-month period. So, why not tour museums with the Grutto Pass?