"EverydayLife during War Times through the Lens of Japanese War Motif Textiles"_29 ottobre
Martedì 29 ottobre, Aula Magna edificio Marco POLO, ore 16:00
Incontro con l'antropologo Klaus Friese
This presentation focuses on Japanese war motif textiles. These garments, which depict modern war scenes but have a traditional cut, appeared during the1894-95 Sino-Japanese war. In the Shōwa period between 1932 and 1942 textiles showing e.g. tanks, airplanes and soldiers were mass produced fashion items. The presentation will give an overview over the history and motifs of those textiles and then will focus on the practices related to these objects. The goal is to use the textiles as a way to better understand how the civilian population (mainly in the urban centers of Japan) tried to make sense of the war time. The textiles made war part of everyday life - but they reveal the often unexpected and also contradictory ways in which civilians dealt with this situation.
Klaus J. Friese is an adjunct lecturer at the Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology of Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich. He holds a double PhD in Cultural Anthropology from Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and in East Asian Art History from the University of Zurich. His research focuses on historical anthropology, material culture and social aesthetics during the war times of modern Japan. In addition, he is working with Japanese art, mainly woodblock prints, in various collections and museums.