Across the walls of a room titled “Birthplace of Yokai,” a restless cast of yōkai (monsters), oni (ogres) and tsukumogami (everyday objects given spirit and will) frolic and play as modern technology brings the supernatural realm closer to the human world.

On view until June 28 at Warehouse Terrada’s G1 Building in Tokyo’s Shinagawa Ward, the “Yokai Immersive Experience Exhibition” positions these creatures not as relics of superstition but as enduring expressions of how people in Japan have made sense of the unknown. As one placard explains, yōkai emerged in the cultural imagination when people gave “names and forms to what they could not explain.” Over time, these manifestations of fear and wonder became storytelling devices, familiar figures and reflections of social anxiety.

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