While the Society now addresses all aspects of Japanese art and culture, it traces its origins to a small group of ukiyo-e print collectors in and around New York City in 1973, at a time when Parke-Bernet Galleries (later to merge with Sotheby's) had begun to develop a market for Japanese art.
The first major auction was the 1969 sale of the Blanche McFetridge estate, consisting of ukiyo-e prints once owned by Frank Lloyd Wright, followed by the 1972 sale of the estate of Hans Popper, a Viennese businessman who spent time working in Japan.
Through its annual lectures, seminars and other events, the Society provides a forum for the exchange ideas and experiences about traditional and contemporary arts of Japan.
The programs and publications of the Society were valuable in the 1970s, when ukiyo-e studies and, for that matter, Edo period art history had scarcely entered the academic mainstream either in the United States or Japan.
[citation needed] The society publishes a quarterly newsletter for members as well as an annual journal, Impressions.