Mirrors & Masks: Reflections and Constructions of the Self

Catalogue of an exhibition held at Bryn Mawr College March 23, 2017-June 4, 2017, curated by Steven Z. Levine and Carrie M. Robbins and students in the year-long course Mirroring the Self/Exhibiting the Self. The exhibition, organized by 11 student curators considers the role of mirrors, masks, makeup, and masquerade in explorations of the self across the centuries and cultures that are represented in Bryn Mawr College’s Art & Artifacts Collection.https://repository.brynmawr.edu/bmc_books/1031/thumbnail.jp

Mirrors & Masks: Reflections and Constructions of the Self

Catalogue of an exhibition held at Bryn Mawr College March 23, 2017-June 4, 2017, curated by Steven Z. Levine and Carrie M. Robbins and students in the year-long course Mirroring the Self/Exhibiting the Self. The exhibition, organized by 11 student curators considers the role of mirrors, masks, makeup, and masquerade in explorations of the self across the centuries and cultures that are represented in Bryn Mawr College’s Art & Artifacts Collection.https://repository.brynmawr.edu/bmc_books/1031/thumbnail.jp

Masks: A New Face for the Theatre

This study seeks to reimagine and reinvigorate modern theatre’s relationship with mask work through text-based historical research and practice-based artistic research. It focuses on three ancient mask traditions: pre- and early Hellenistic Greek theatre, Japanese Noh theatre, and Nigerian Egungun masquerades. Research on these mask traditions and recent masked productions informed the development and staging of a masked performance of Charles Mee’s Life is a Dream. The production featured sections for each of the ancient masking styles and a final section that explored masks in a contemporary theatrical style. As a whole, this creative project pulls masks out of their historical context to discuss their relevance for contemporary theatre artists and to demonstrate how ancient traditions can inspire new work

The Meaning of the Mask: Darth Vader on the Screen and the Page

Masks can be found throughout popular culture, and their roots trace back through history. Whether on the screen, the page of a comic book, the stage, or in the halls of a Comic-Con, masked faces are intriguing. Among the numerous masked faces that populate our imagination, few are as iconic and instantly recognizable as Darth Vader from Star Wars. Despite his popularity, most of the research devoted to masked characters has been interested in why heroes such as Batman wear masks. There is little research on why a tragic hero turned villain does so, since the connotation of masks seems to be inherently negative. Thus, many have concluded that Vader wears a mask because he is a villain. In this thesis, I challenge this one-sided notion of masks and explore the nuance of masks through the character of Darth Vader. In the first chapter, I analyze the meaning of the mask in terms of storytelling – what it means to Vader, to those who know who lies behind the mask, and to those who do not. In the second chapter, I look at how the work done to bring a masked character like Darth Vader to life influences our perception of masks and adds to their meaning

Intertextuality and Corporality in Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s Shutendōji makura kotoba

Among Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s jōruri, there are two dramas which feature the legend of Shutendōji: Shutendōji makura no koto no ha/Shutendōji makurakotoba (first representation in 1709) and Keisei Shutendōji (1718). In this paper I focus on Shutendōji makurakotoba, performed at Takemotoza with Takemoto Gidayū (1651-1714) as the main chanter, and I will consider in particular the theme of corporality as it appears in Chikamatsu’s puppet dramas. Shutendōji makurakotoba is built upon the various legends concerning Shutendōji in emaki, ezōshi, monogatari, Naraehon, otogizōshi, or yōkyoku (nō texts) such as Ōeyama and kojōruri, but presents a much more elaborate plot. This work by Chikamatsu depicts numerous heroic adventures carried out by Minamoto no Raikō and his shitennō (“Four Heavenly Kings”), managing to combine them in a coherent plot. In particular, in his jōruri, Shutendōji, as a “child”-demon or monster, is slayed by Raikō and his loyal retainers, but just as the nō drama Ōeyama demonstrates a feeling of sympathy to the demon, the drama by Chikamatsu also enhances the humanity and sorrow of Shutendōji as a human who has tragically become a demon. This transformation manifests itself in his appearance and physical aspect, as well as in his terrible actions. Additionally we see migawari 身替り(self-other exchange, exchange of person or body) emerge as a central theme--a significant expedient in the development of the history of puppet theatre dramaturgy, which becomes a decisive and recurrent device in Chikamatsu’s theatre. The motif in this case is manifested in the tragedy of women as victims, and female characters in particular, who are replaced, sold, kidnapped, and sacrificed. If the leading theme is a series of such migawari, the theme of corporality, of the person and his body, is also entwined and appears at the root. By comparing this jōruri with previous literary works and plays (with reference to the New Classical Sources data base), in this paper I will examine the story of Shutendōji in puppet theatre, and its adaptation to new premodern sensibilities

Dragons behind glass: views of China and Japan in three American museums

This thesis will focus on three museums: the American Museum of Natural History in New York, New York, the Mobile Museum of Art in Mobile, Alabama and the Morikami Museum in Del Ray Beach, Florida. Overall the museums took surprisingly different approaches to designing their exhibits. The American Museum of Natural History gave a general overview of Japan and China. The Mobile Museum of Art focused only on pottery and the Morikami Museum focused on the Japanese immigrants that settled in Del Ray Beach. Differences and similarities of these museums and what these exhibits tell the viewer about the two cultures will be addressed in this thesis. It will present a view on what these museums could have done differently to better explain the uniqueness of Japan and China. The American Museum of Natural History and the Mobile Museum of Art presented Japan and China as static and unchanging cultures; this is far from the truth. On the other hand, the Morikami Museum showed how the Japanese immigrant community is a rich community that has changed over time. The Morikami Museum created a unique exhibit that immersed the viewer into the Japanese culture and really showed what meaning the artifacts held in the culture, which is something the other museums failed to do

Kissing Dolores

In The Book of Dolores, a series of self-portraits in photography and drawings with accompanying text, William T. Vollmann pictures himself as a cross-dresser. He uses various techniques that emphasize the pictorial approach of photography, to create an uncanny icon of femininity. As an attempt to reach the other side, not just of gender, but of life, his negative prints in particular seem to reveal a ghostly presence.In TheBook of Dolores, una serie di autoritratti fotografici e disegnati e accompagnati da un testo scritto, William T. Vollmann si ritrae come un travestito. Utilizza diverse tecniche che enfatizzano l’approccio pittorialista alla fotografia per creare un’icona perturbante della femminilità. Tentativi di raggiungere l’altro lato, non solo del genere, ma anche della vita, i suoi negativi, in particolare, sembrano rivelare una presenza spettrale

Dramaturgical Crossroads and Aesthetic Transformations: Modern and Contemporary Adaptations of Classical Japanese Nō Drama

This study explores the various dramaturgical strategies at work within the twentieth and twenty-first-century theatrical adaptation of the Japanese Nō drama. At its core are questions regarding the methodology utilized in the updating of an innately supernatural and spiritual aesthetic into the increasingly secularized world of the present, and how those supernatural elements are often transformed into metaphorical constructs. Ultimately, I examine how the transformative aesthetic that has given the Nō its literary power over the past 700 years is the very aspect that permits it to facilitate, resist, and assimilate the strategies of dramatic adaptation. My primary categories for adaptation include the direct and indirect, which refer to the existence: or not) of a direct textual analogue within a specific style of classical literature. I break this down further into the sub-categories of correlative, extrapolative, interpolative, and stylistic adaptation, each dependent upon the degree to which the modern author adheres to the variants and invariants of an extant text or literary tradition. Throughout the study, I return periodically to the work of Gèrard Genette and Linda Hutcheon, basing my primary criteria for successful dramaturgical adaptation on their theories of metatextuality, palimpsests, and textual oscillation. Additionally, because of the specific supernatural context of the Nō, I refer substantively to Victor Turner\u27s anthropological theories of liminality to explore the transformative agenda of the Nō, both classical and modern/contemporary. In order to contextualize my specific criteria and methodology for the study of textual transformation and oscillation between classical Nō and its modern analogues during the past century, I first explore the particular strategies of adaptation as they apply to twentieth- and twenty-first-century theatrical versions of classical Greek myth. Perhaps the greatest innovator of the Nō form in the twentieth century, and the individual who may be credited with popularizing its awareness on an international level, is Yukio Mishima, whose publication of nine modern Nō plays in the 1950s and 1960s revolutionized the way the world looked at the classical genre. His adaptations, both extrapolative and interpolative in nature, transform textual antecedents from the popular Nō canon into statements of the increasing tension between an idealized ancient Japanese past and the Westernized world of the post-war present. He transforms the Nō into political metaphors written in a Western style, their supernatural elements altered to represent the ghosts of a disappearing culture, thrusting themselves into an alien, amnesiac world of neon and concrete to warn of impending spiritual death. My primary text for the exploration of Mishima\u27s tactics and agenda in the creation of the modern Nō is his 1956 adaptation of Aoi no ue, in which the iconic character of Prince Genji is converted into a Westernized businessman. This example clearly depicts how Mishima engages in strategies of inversion and subversion to achieve his aesthetic and political goals, yet retains recognizable conventions of the Nō\u27s classical framework. I also examine Mishima\u27s theatrical legacy within the context of contemporary Japanese playwrights like Takeshi Kawamura, who have continued the trajectory of Mishima\u27s adaptations of Nō into the present. My examination of contemporary American Nō plays contextualizes the strategy of indirect dramatic adaptation within the framework of stylistic homage, rather than any other forms that utilize the Nō structure and conventions for parodic or satirical purposes. My primary examples, Kenneth Yasuda\u27s Martin Luther King, Jr.: A Nō Play and Deborah Brevoort\u27s Blue Moon Over Memphis, not only imitate the style and literary architecture of the classical Nō: while updating these conventions for contemporary audiences), but they honor the religio-aesthetic tone of the traditional Nō canon as well. This is accomplished by re-imagining their pop culture shite figures as modern-day bodhisattvas, spiritually transcendent beings who remain in the physical world in order to pass on their enlightenment to others, in these examples represented by the waki roles. In conclusion, I propose the continued evolution of the Nō into the twenty-first century and beyond by considering the various means by which the form both resists and encourages transformation of content and context, as well as the assertion that, as a culture progresses forward in time, so do its ghosts adapt with the march of time