In 1853, an American commodore named Matthew Perry arrived on the shores of Japan. In tow: a fleet of steam-powered warships, packed with objects from a foreign world—the West. His arrival marked the end of more than two centuries of national isolation under the Tokugawa shogunate. The port city of Yokohama soon became a major treaty settlement, and into it surged new artistic ideas—Western newspaper illustrations and photography. Thirteen years after Perry’s landing, the shogunate collapsed and imperial rule was restored, launching a period known as bunmei kaika, or “civilization and enlightenment.” This exhibition presents prints from that era of seismic cultural transformation. —Elena Clavarino