The Museum of Gourd is curated by renowned Japanese photographer, filmmaker, and theorist Chihiro Minato. Currently a professor in the department of Information Design at Tama Art University and a founding member of its Institute for Art Anthropology (established 2006), he received the Suntory Academic Award for Social Sciences and Humanities (1997) for his written work Memory—The power of creating and remembering. Minato’s theoretical practice investigates the way communication and information technology penetrates all aspects of our lives. Solo exhibitions of his work have been shown at Nikon Salon Gallery, Tokyo (2006), Institut Franco-Japonais, Tokyo (2001), the Museum of Modern Art, Ljubljana, Slovenia (1998), and Gallery IDEM, Paris (1998). His work has been included in group exhibitions at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art (2002), theTokyo National Museum of Modern Art (2002), the Gravelin Museum, France (2001),and the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography (1993). In addition, his curatorial projects have been shown at the Japanese Pavilion at the Venice Biennale (2007), Tama Art University (2007), the Busan Biennale, Korea (2006), and the Japan Cultural Institute in Cologne, Germany (2002). He has published widely, and in addition to the Suntory Award, he received the INA NOBUA Prize for Photography (2006), the Multimedia Grandprix Award of MMCA (1997), and in 1982, the Gasei Scholarship from Argentina, which enabled him to travel throughout South America.