NAGOYA--City officials here decided to close a gallery hosting a controversial exhibition until July 11 “for safety,” after it received an exploding package in the mail.

The gallery had been displaying works that had resulted in the temporary suspension of the “After ‘Freedom of Expression?’” exhibit at the Aichi Triennale 2019 international art festival due to protests and threats.

The temporary closure of the gallery will effectively shut down the exhibit, which was scheduled to run from July 6 through July 11.

Nagoya Mayor Takashi Kawamura told reporters on the afternoon of July 8 that he believes the device in the mail was aimed at obstructing the exhibit.

Kawamura, who in 2019 strongly protested the exhibit's display of a sculpture symbolizing “comfort women,” who were forced to provide sex to Japanese soldiers before and during World War II, and other controversial works featured there, said the closure "won’t set a bad precedent.” 

“The incident was not (just) a threat but an actual harm done to citizens," he said. "We shouldn’t just let it (the exhibition) continue. The city is responsible for managing the gallery, and it’s natural to close it to secure the safety of citizens.”

At around 9:30 a.m. on July 8, a suspicious piece of mail exploded at the Sakae municipal gallery when a gallery staff member was opening it, according to the Naka Police Station in Aichi Prefecture.

The gallery occupies the seventh and eighth floors of a building in Nagoya’s Naka Ward, and the exhibit space is on the eighth floor, said police.

At the time of the explosion, people were waiting on the eighth floor to enter the venue for the exhibition, which was due to open at 10 a.m.

The staff opened the package, measuring 23 centimeters by 12 cm, in a seventh-floor office of the Nagoya City Cultural Promotion Agency, which manages the gallery.

What appeared to be a firecracker then exploded about 10 times, scattering black powder, according to investigative sources. The parcel, addressed to the gallery, also contained a document demanding the cancelation of the exhibit, the sources said.

A police officer in charge of ensuring security at the venue was also present when the staff opened the mail, but no one was injured in the incident.

Aichi prefectural police and gallery’s staff members immediately closed the gallery and all visitors who came to see the exhibit were told to leave the building. Police are now investigating the incident on suspicion of forcible obstruction of business.

The ward office is also located in the building, but the explosion did not disrupt its normal operations.

“The incident was beyond the level that we can handle by tightening security and could have caused injuries,” a city official said. “We take the incident seriously and have decided to close the gallery.”

The official said the city decided to shutter the gallery until July 11 because it is the end of the exhibition’s schedule.

“It was an extremely agonizing decision,” another city official in charge of the exhibit said of the effective cancelation of the event. “We were able to hold the exhibition at least for two days. We also took sufficient security measures.”

The exhibition in Nagoya was planned by a citizens’ group that protested the suspension of the 2019 exhibit.

But as soon as it opened on July 6, protesters and counter-protesters started staging rallies in front of the building.

People associated with a political group with an anti-immigration platform planned to hold a separate exhibition on the eighth floor of the building between July 9 and July 11 to counter the one held there. But that event was also canceled.

Satoshi Yokodaido, a professor of the Constitution at Keio University Graduate School, said it is outrageous that people have been robbed of an opportunity to express themselves in public by threats. He also questioned the city’s decision to effectively cancel the exhibition.

Yokodaido pointed out that the Supreme Court previously ruled that denying the use of a public facility is allowed only when there is clearly a specific, foreseeable and imminent danger.

He said not allowing an event to be held at a public facility for the sake of safety effectively grants those opposing the event a “veto” and urged the city to make the utmost efforts to protect freedom of expression.