東京タロット美術館　Tokyo Tarot Museum

東京タロット美術館　Tokyo Tarot Museum The Tokyo Tarot Museum explores tarot as a language of symbols and inner dialogue. A quiet space where art and philosophy meet.

Advance reservation required from the official site.

AWAI — The Space BetweenWe are always living in the space between.Logos and Idea.The Four Elements and the Five Phases.W...
02/09/2026

AWAI — The Space Between

We are always living in the space between.

Logos and Idea.
The Four Elements and the Five Phases.
West and East.
Science and spirit.
The visible and the invisible.
Word and soul.

Since ancient times, humanity has sought different ways to understand the world.

To distinguish, name, and measure.
To connect, feel, and discover meaning.

Neither is the only truth.
Perhaps each is simply a different window through which we see the world.

In Japanese, there is a beautiful word: awai.

It is neither here nor there.
Nor is it simply a boundary separating two things.

It is the space where differences meet and resonate,
where something not yet named can emerge.

Looking up at the evening sky,
I saw a cloud that seemed to take the form of a dragon.

A cloud is a cloud.
And yet, we can also see a dragon within it.

A cloud, and a dragon.

Fact and imagination.
Science and spirit.
Reason and intuition.
East and West.
The visible and the invisible.

Rather than choosing one over the other,
perhaps we can stand in the awai between them.

It may be from this space that our stories and art—and new ways of seeing the world—are born.

Words give the world its contours.
The soul moves beyond them.

Tarot, too, exists in this awai
between the visible and the invisible.

Not simply to give us answers,
but to enter into dialogue with
what has not yet found its words.

Between what we see and what we imagine, meaning begins.

Tarot was born in the West.And today, its story continues to be written around the world.Born in Renaissance Italy some ...
01/09/2026

Tarot was born in the West.
And today, its story continues to be written around the world.

Born in Renaissance Italy some 500 years ago, Tarot traveled through France and Britain before spreading across cultures and continents.

At the Tokyo Tarot Museum, we look not only at Tarot’s long history, but also at what it can become.

Beyond fortune-telling,
Tarot as art.
Tarot as philosophy.
Tarot as a dialogue with the self.
And Tarot as a living culture that continues to evolve.

We honor the history we have inherited while continuing to ask what might come next.

Five centuries of Tarot have reached us from the West.
Now, from Tokyo in Asia, we hope to carry that story forward and share it with the world once again.

Not only preserving history,
but nurturing a living culture and adding a new chapter to its story.

Honoring Tarot’s past. Opening its future.

This is the role the Tokyo Tarot Museum hopes to play in the world.

タロットは西洋で生まれた。
そして今、その物語は世界中で書き続けられている。

約500年前、イタリア・ルネサンス期に生まれたタロットは、フランス、イギリスへと渡り、やがて世界へ広がっていきました。

東京タロット美術館が向き合っているのは、その長い歴史だけではありません。

占いという枠を越えて、
芸術として。
哲学として。
自己との対話として。
そして、今も変化し続ける「生きた文化」として。

私たちは、タロットの歴史に敬意を払いながら、その先に何が生まれるのかを考え続けています。

西洋から受け取った500年の文化を、
アジアの東京から、もう一度世界へ。

歴史を保存するだけではなく、
新しい文化を育て、新しい一章を加えていく。

タロットの過去を守り、未来をひらく。

それが、東京タロット美術館が世界の中で果たしたい役割です。

#東京タロット美術館

“Who are you?” I asked the Jomon Venus.“Who are you?” she asked in return.Thousands of years may separate us,but the hum...
01/09/2026

“Who are you?” I asked the Jomon Venus.
“Who are you?” she asked in return.

Thousands of years may separate us,
but the human question remains much the same.

We look into the past.
Yet the past looks back at us.

Art does not leave us answers.
It leaves us questions.

「あなたは何者だ」と、縄文のヴィーナスに尋ねた。
「おまえこそ、何者だ」と返された。

数千年を隔てても、
人間の問いは、あまり変わらない。

私たちは過去を見ている。
けれど、過去もまた、私たちを見ている。

芸術は、答えを残さない。
問いを残す。

#縄文 #縄文土偶 #古代美術 #哲学

Walking through the streets of Japan, you will sometimes come across a simple sign that says: “Fortune-Telling.”What mak...
01/09/2026

Walking through the streets of Japan, you will sometimes come across a simple sign that says: “Fortune-Telling.”

What makes Japanese divination culture fascinating is the way different traditions coexist.

Omikuji at shrines and temples, palmistry, Four Pillars, Western astrology, and Tarot—East and West, tradition and modernity, all living side by side.

Tarot became widely known in Japan during the 1970s through books, magazines, and popular culture.

Half a century later, Japan’s major fortune-telling service sectors are estimated to represent a market of nearly ¥100 billion.

Running the Tokyo Tarot Museum, I can feel another change taking place.

People come to Tarot not only to read the future, but to understand themselves, appreciate art, explore history, collect decks, and create dialogue with others.

Perhaps this is something distinctive about Japan: absorbing traditions from elsewhere, allowing them to coexist with what is already here, and gradually giving them new meanings.

And in a society increasingly obsessed with “time performance”—getting answers faster and more efficiently—there may be something especially meaningful about sitting with 78 cards, looking at an image, thinking, and taking time to reflect.

Tarot entered Japanese popular culture half a century ago.

Where will these 78 cards go next in Japan?

A light for those in our thoughts.Our hearts go out to all those affected by natural disasters in Nepal and around the w...
31/08/2026

A light for those in our thoughts.

Our hearts go out to all those affected by natural disasters in Nepal and around the world.

We remember those who have lost their lives, and we hold in our thoughts all who are facing loss, uncertainty, and hardship.

In the face of nature, we are reminded of how fragile life can be—and how important it is to care for one another, even across great distances.

May those who have passed rest in peace.
May comfort and support reach all those in need.
And may this small light carry our hope for calmer days ahead.

I recently received a copy of Ryuji Kagami’s latest book, The True Nature of Fortune-Tellers: Why Are We Drawn to Divina...
31/08/2026

I recently received a copy of Ryuji Kagami’s latest book, The True Nature of Fortune-Tellers: Why Are We Drawn to Divination?

As I was reading, I was surprised to come across my own name—and suddenly, a memory from nearly half a century ago returned.

I believe Ryuji was still in junior high school at the time.

In the 1970s, our company had a showroom filled with tarot decks from around the world, celestial globes, and objects related to divination and magic.

Every so often, a young Ryuji would come in and gaze intently at the tarot cards. I don’t remember us ever speaking, but I still remember the boy completely absorbed in the cards before him.

In fact, he was one of the reasons I began studying divination and magic myself.

Seeing a boy around my age so fascinated by tarot, my father said something like:

“If a boy your age can be that serious about it, why don’t you try studying divination too?”

The 1970s were a formative period for tarot in Japan. Our company was visited by figures such as Alexandria Mokuseio, one of the pioneers of tarot in Japan, as well as people from the world of magic, including Tenko Hikita.

Growing up in that environment, I began studying divination and magic.

Although, to tell the truth, what I really wanted to learn was the piano.

Nearly fifty years later, the boy who once stood mesmerized by tarot became one of Japan’s leading astrologers and writers.

And the other boy, who began studying divination partly because of him, somehow became the director of the Tokyo Tarot Museum.

Nearly half a century later, our paths cross again through tarot.

Tarot and astrology have travelled across borders, languages, and cultures. They are not simply about predicting the future, but also about understanding ourselves and entering into dialogue with the unknown.

Why do we look up at the stars?
Why do we turn over a card?
Why do we search for ourselves in what we find there?

Perhaps these are questions that belong to all of us.

Thank you for this wonderful book—and for bringing back a memory from the early days of tarot in Japan.

Was tarot always meant for divination?The Mantegna Tarocchi is a remarkable series of fifty engravings created in Renais...
31/08/2026

Was tarot always meant for divination?

The Mantegna Tarocchi is a remarkable series of fifty engravings created in Renaissance Italy in the fifteenth century.

Despite its name, it is not a tarot deck in the way we understand tarot today, nor is it thought to have been created primarily for fortune-telling.

What it presents instead is something much larger: a vision of the world.

Its fifty images are arranged in five groups of ten, moving through different levels of existence—from human society to the arts and knowledge, from virtues to the celestial spheres, ultimately reaching the Prima Causa, the “First Cause.”

Humanity.
Art.
Knowledge.
Virtue.
The Cosmos.

In a sense, the Mantegna Tarocchi is a visual map of the Renaissance universe.

What makes it especially fascinating is that it emerged from the same cultural world as the earliest tarot cards—a world shaped by Christianity, classical antiquity, philosophy, astrology, social order, and cosmology.

The images of tarot were never merely decorative.

What is a human being?
What is the world?
And where do we stand within the cosmos?

For centuries, people have entrusted such questions to images.

To explore the history of tarot, then, is not simply to explore the history of divination.

It is to explore the history of humanity trying to understand the world—and itself.

Tarot is not only divination.
Tarot is a way of seeing the world.





Tokyo Tarot Museum is proud to once again support emerging Vietnamese artists through CEC Vietnam.Tarot has a long histo...
30/08/2026

Tokyo Tarot Museum is proud to once again support emerging Vietnamese artists through CEC Vietnam.

Tarot has a long history.
But its future has always been shaped by the imagination of new generations.

When people from different places and cultures meet through the shared language of Tarot, each brings their own stories, symbols, and ways of seeing the world.

And from these encounters, new visions of Tarot emerge.

CEC Vietnam celebrates art, creativity, and the future of the cartomancy community.

This December, I will be visiting Hanoi, and I look forward to meeting a new generation of Vietnamese artists and discovering the ideas, stories, and visions behind their work.

Across cultures.
Across generations.
Toward the future of Tarot.

Tokyo Tarot Museum will continue to stand with emerging voices around the world and explore, together, what Tarot can become.

東京タロット美術館では、東京タロット美術館館長による講座「はじめてのタロット もう一度タロット〜自己を知るための象徴の読み方〜」を定期的に開催しています。タロットの歴史やカードに描かれた象徴を入り口に、美術、哲学、心理、そして人生について考...
30/08/2026

東京タロット美術館では、
東京タロット美術館館長による講座
「はじめてのタロット もう一度タロット
〜自己を知るための象徴の読み方〜」を定期的に開催しています。

タロットの歴史やカードに描かれた象徴を入り口に、美術、哲学、心理、そして人生について考える講座です。

本日の参加者の皆さまからは、

「タロット講座というより、教養や哲学を学んだような感覚が残りました」

「占いというより、“自己探究のツール”という言葉が心に残りました」

「自分の人生をどのように主体的に生きるのか、考えさせられました」

といった言葉をいただきました。

タロットは、未来を知るためだけのものなのでしょうか。

一枚のカードを前にして、
何を見て、何を感じ、何を考えるのか。

同じカードを見ても、そこから生まれる物語は一人ひとり違います。

だからこそタロットは、「答え」を与えるものではなく、自分自身に「問い」を返してくれるものなのかもしれません。

タロットを読むことは、自分自身を読むこと。

500年以上にわたり、人から人へと受け継がれてきたタロット。

その象徴は時代や国境を越え、今日を生きる私たちにも、新しい問いを投げかけています。

本日ご参加いただいた皆さま、ありがとうございました。

At the Tokyo Tarot Museum, we regularly offer a course led by the Museum Director:

“Tarot for the First Time, Tarot Once Again — Reading Symbols as a Way of Knowing Ourselves.”

Beginning with the history of tarot and the symbols within the cards, the course opens into a broader exploration of art, philosophy, psychology, and life itself.

Today, participants shared reflections such as:

“It felt less like a tarot class and more like an exploration of philosophy and the humanities.”

“The idea of tarot not simply as divination, but as a tool for self-inquiry, stayed with me.”

“It made me think about what it means to live my own life with greater agency.”

Is tarot only a way of knowing the future?

When we sit before a single card, what do we see, feel, and think?

Even when looking at the same card, each of us may discover a different story.

Perhaps tarot is not something that simply gives us “answers,” but something that returns us to our own questions.

To read tarot is also to read ourselves.

For more than 500 years, tarot has passed from hand to hand and from generation to generation.

Across time, cultures, and borders, its symbols continue to ask new questions of those of us living today.

Thank you to everyone who joined us.

Over time, we have learned to understand nature, predict it, and even believe that we can control it.And yet, nature som...
29/08/2026

Over time, we have learned to understand nature, predict it, and even believe that we can control it.

And yet, nature sometimes reveals a power far beyond anything we can imagine.

In those moments, I find myself wondering:

When did we begin to believe that nature was something we could master?

The mountains, the oceans, the forests, the earth itself—
they were here long before us.

And we, too, are nature.

Our bodies, our breath, our very lives are part of its greater cycle.

Humanity and nature were never truly separate.

Perhaps what we need now is to remember that we are part of nature, and to restore our connection with it.

And perhaps, sometimes, we need to surrender to nature.

Surrender does not mean giving up.
Nor does it mean submitting in defeat.

It means letting go of the need to control everything, and accepting that there are things beyond our power.

From that acceptance comes a sense of awe.

Awe is more than fear.

It is standing before something greater than ourselves and recognizing how small we are—
while also realizing that we belong to it.

When we forget this, human intelligence can easily turn into arrogance.

Rather than conquering nature, live with it.
Rather than possessing nature, respect it.

To surrender to nature is not to be defeated by it.

It is to remember:

We, too, are nature.

From arrogance to awe.
From control to surrender.

Perhaps tarot, too, is not simply about finding the answers we want.

Sometimes, it is about receiving the card that appears before us exactly as it is.

Can you surrender
to the card that appears before you?

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台東区柳橋2-4-2　Landman 浅草橋6階
Taito-ku, Tokyo
1110052

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