Seiji Tsutsumi is widely recognized as a visionary business leader who helped shape the lifestyles of his era through the development of numerous companies, including Seibu Department Stores, Seiyu Stores (now Seiyu), PARCO, FamilyMart, Seibu Credit (now Credit Saison), MUJI, and Yoshinoya. At the same time, under the pen name Takashi Tsujii, he pursued a distinguished literary career as a poet and novelist. Beginning with Ihojin, which received the Muro Saisei Poet Prize, he published numerous acclaimed works, including Gunjo, Waga Mokushi, recipient of the Takami Jun Prize; the long poem Watatsumi Trilogy, awarded the Fujimura Memorial Rekitei Prize; and the novels Itsumo to Onaji Haru, Niji no Misaki, Shizumeru Shiro, and Chichi no Shozo, which received major literary awards. Over the course of his life, he published more than 120 books.Putting into practice his own idea of a “reconciliation between the businessperson and the artist,” Tsutsumi and Tsujii came together in the founding of the Sezon Museum of Modern Art in Karuizawa in 1981.
This exhibition revisits the origins of these “two perspectives”—Seiji Tsutsumi and Takashi Tsujii—through works from the Museum’s collection that he cherished, his complete writings, original manuscripts, and artworks he kept close at hand, offering a renewed appreciation of his exceptional intellect and sensibility.