On November 30th, the Aomori Prefectural Museum of Art (Yasuda, Aomori City, TEL 017-783-3000 ) began selling the official catalog for the special exhibition ``Yoshitomo Nara: The Beginning Place From Here.''

This is the first solo exhibition held at the museum in about 10 years. Approximately 200 works, including paintings and three-dimensional works created by artist Yoshitomo Nara from Aomori Prefecture, will be on display, including new works. The event started on October 14th and reached a record 20,000 visitors by November 14th.

The official catalog includes a list of all works in the exhibition in color, as well as a detailed chronology and conversation with Nara, as well as essays by a philosophy researcher and an American cultural historian. B5 size, 348 pages. It is supervised by the Aomori Museum of Art and published by the Yoshitomo Nara Foundation.

The cover features a close-up of the main visual of the solo exhibition, ``Midnight Tears.'' The back of the cover features a black and white photo of an apple field with fallen apples. Shigemi Takahashi, curator in charge of the exhibition, says, ``The binding is based on the image of the landscape of Nara's hometown, which is embedded beneath the layers of Nara's paintings.''

Tickets will be sold in advance at the venue, and will also go on sale outside the venue from mid-December. Mr. Takahashi said, ``I designed the content to delve into the activities after the earthquake and the relationship with my hometown, and I designed the structure to be led by photographs that convey the relationship between the works and the atmosphere of the exhibition.I hope it will be used for a long time. I'm happy," he says.

The price is 3,850 yen.