Baba Takako founded Contemporary Art Gallery CHIKA on April 3, 1991. During the peak of the bubble economy in the 1980s, she had lived abroad and seen Japan from an outside perspective. This led her to fear that positive aspects of traditional culture were being lost and art was being treated as a financial resource. By collaborating with artists and investing time and effort, she established the gallery as a workshop for producing culture and a place for sharing good art with the public.