The Art Research Center at Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto received one of the highly competitive research grants by Japan's Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) to establish a Global COE (Center of Excellence) programme in 2007. The Art Research Center, which has cooperative research agreements with both the Sainsbury Institute and the Department of Art and Archaeology, SOAS, plans to create a new a 'Digital Humanities Center for Japanese Art and Culture'. In connection with this project, John T. Carpenter will serve as an international adviser, and has been concurrently appointed as Adjunct Professor at Ritsumeikan University, initially for a five-year term.

This project expands on one of the Art Research Center's earlier COE projects to create digital archives and assemble databases of Japanese cultural artefacts, particularly focusing on woodblock prints, painting and calligraphy. It taps into new developments in the discipline of 'Digital Humanities' in the USA and Europe, to transmit knowledge of Japanese culture to scholars worldwide. Since Ritsumeikan is located in the historical city of Kyoto, one of its priorities naturallly continues to be a study of ancient and medieval Japanese culture, a speciality of Kawashima Masao, one of the directors of the new COE programme. Yet, in keeping with the spirit of international cooperation established in the previous COE programme, under the supervision of Akama Ryo, the Art Research Center also continues its work to establish digital archives and databases of ukiyo-e prints in Western collections.