Engei Shashin / Engei Shashinchō

演藝寫眞 [演芸写真] / 演藝寫真帖 [演芸写真帖] 

(Performing Arts Photographic / Performing Arts Photographic Album)

A CONTINUING WORK

Click on thumbnail to see selected pages from that issue

Engei shashin 演藝寫眞 (Performing Arts Photographic) and

Engei shashinchō 演藝寫眞帖 (Performing Arts Photographic Album)

Published monthly from July 1921 through September 1928, Engei shashin 演藝寫眞 was one of the earliest pictorial magazines covering theater and film through photographs and accompanying text. It was published during a time when kabuki, sometimes referred to as "old school" (kyūha) theater, shared the stage and the theater-goer's money with newer forms of theater, shimpa (shimpageki - "new school drama") and shingeki ("new theater"), along with opera (e.g. Asakusa Opera 浅草オペラ), ballet and dance.[1]

Over Engei shashin's seven year lifetime, its publishing company changed three times, as recorded in the magazine's colophon. Initially issued by Kansai bungeisha 関西文藝社 (as managed by Engei shashinsha 演藝寫眞社), with editor and publisher 高島駒之助 (Takashima Komanosuke), in January 1925 (Vol. 4, No. 1) its publishing company briefly changed to Engei shunjūsha 演藝春秋社, editor and publisher 中島彌 (Nakajima Ya - reading uncertain), followed in March 1925 (Vol. 4, No. 3), by the publisher Taishō tsūshinsha 大正通信社 with the same editor and publisher, 中島彌 (Nakajima Ya?).[2] In the May 1925 issue (Vol. 4, No. 5) the merger of the three companies—Taishō tsūshinsha, Engei shunjūsha, and Kansai bungeisha—was announced. Starting with the June 1925 (Vol. 4, No. 6) the magazine was published under the name Taishō tsūshinsha.

With the change in publisher to Engei shunjūsha in January 1925 the magazine's title was changed to 演藝冩眞帖 Engei shashinchō (Performing Arts Photographic Album).[3] With the December 1927 issue (Volume 6, No. 12), the title appearing on its cover was changed back to 演藝寫眞 Engei shashin (Performing Arts Photographic).

As a magazine devoted to the performing arts, publishing at a time when entertainment magazines were at the height of their popularity, it had a number of competitors, including Shibai to Kinema 芝居とキネマ (Stage and Screen), launched in September 1924 (ended May 1929), published by Ōsaka Mainichi Shinbunsha 大阪毎日新聞社, Eiga to engei 映画と演藝 published beginning in September 1924 by Ōsaka Asahi Shinbunsha 大阪朝日新聞社, and the long lasting and influential Engei gahō 演藝畫報, a smaller format magazine, originally published from 1907 to 1943 by Engei Gahōsha 演藝畫報社. 

Engei shashin and Three of its Top Competitors

Responding to what must have been fierce competition, Engei shashin's preface would often chastise its competitors, without naming them, for copying their content or not presenting current plays and films, warning their readers against "imposter" magazines who conduct "fraudulent activities under the guise of our brand." 

Engei shashin's pictorial content was largely photographs (shashin), depicting stage scenes, backstage photos, photos of actor "private" lives, movie stills, and portraits of actors. As reproductive and printing technologies improved, more color photographs with better resolution (e.g. 3-color separations) appeared in its pages. To build circulation, it offered its readers contests where winners received free issues and other perks such as fold out high-quality reproductions of theater-related ukiyo-e woodblock prints.

The cover of each issue featured a color lithograph of an actor in role and most, if not all, issues contained a color lithograph frontispiece of a well-known kabuki actor in character. The designs for these works were commissioned from both lesser-known and well-known shin hanga artists, including Kawase Hasui 川瀬巴水 (1883-1957), primarily known for his landscape work, who designed 34 covers for the magazine between October 1925 and July 1928, Natori Shunsen 名取春仙 (1886-1960), the foremost designer of actor portraits, nigao-e, in the shin hanga style, Itō Shinsui 伊東深水 (1898-1972) who specialized in the bijinga (beautiful women) genre in the shin hanga style, and Matsuda Seifū 松田青風 (1880-1978), known for his depictions of actors and his lifelong study and documentation of theatrical wigs.  

The photographs appearing in the magazine are uncredited, with some likely taken by in-house and contracted photographers and others provided by distribution and entertainment companies, including Shōchiku 松竹 (see examples below) the entertainment giant whose businesses included actor and troupe management, theater ownership and management, and a film studio.[4]

The magazine's title is seen transcribed on the web in various ways reflecting variants and simplified forms of the characters appearing in its printed title on the cover 演藝冩眞.[5] In addition to the English translation of the magazine's title I've chosen, "Performing Arts Photographic" and, when its title changed from Engei shashin to Engei shashinchō, "Performing Arts Photographic Album," other translations are often seen, such as "Theater Photo Album" or "Photo Album of Performances."[6]

[1] Shinpa [also seen written as shimpa] which made is debut in the 1880s was "built on kabuki performance styles" while incorporating "contemporary political drama and sentimental melodrama." Shingeki ("new theater"), which became popular in the early 1900s, was inspired by Western theater which brought "a different style to stage works in a completely new genre: plays [adaptations of works by Shakespeare, Ibsen, Tolstoy, etc.] translated by literary figures into the vernacular [and contemporary works by Japanese authors] presented using female as well as male actors." [Edo Kabuki in Transition from the Worlds of the Samurai to the Vengeful Female Ghost, Satoko Shimazaki, Columbia University Press New York, 2016, p. 238-239.]

[2] Taishō Tsūshinsha was a domestic news agency formed in 1901. [See Creating a Public: People and Press in Meiji Japan, James L. Huffman, University of Hawai'i Press, 1997, p. 471n64.] In addition to Engei shashinchō, it published a number of magazines, including Kokusai gahō 国際画報 (The International Pictorial News), Shashin tsūshin 寫眞通信 (The Monthly Photographic Illustrated) and Gekkan eiga 月刊映画 (Screen Pioneer).

[3] The title 演藝冩眞帖 is also seen romanized as Engei shashinjō.

[4] The Shōchiku 松竹 theatrical conglomerate traces its roots back to 1895 when Takejirō Ōtani started promoting theatrical performances as the owner of Kyoto Shin Kyōgoku Hani-za. In 1902 he was joined by his twin brother Shirai Matsujirō in establishing the general partnership company of Shōchiku. Within a few years, Kyoto's Minami-za, Osaka's Bunraku-za, Tokyo's Shintomiza and Kabuki-za came under their control and they moved into the movie business in 1920 with Kamata Studios and a string of film theaters. By 1930 Shōchiku purchased or acquired control over all the large theatres that staged kabuki in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto, and they placed all kabuki actors under personal contract. The Shōchiku conglomerate is still strong today with an entertainment focused venture company in addition to a multitude of other entertainment-related companies. 

[5] Character variants seen in Engei shashin's title include: 

"冩" a variant of the traditional character "寫"

"写" simplified form of "冩" and "寫"

"芸" simplified form of "藝"

"真" simplified form of "眞" 

The magazine's title is most commonly written using the simplified characters 演芸写真 and 演芸写真帖

[6] The British Museum which holds eight issues simply references the magazine as an "Illustrated magazine on the theatre."

A Personal Note

I originally came across these magazines while looking for Japanese theater ephemera on Japan Yahoo and similar sites to augment a future exhibition on the Japanese theater arts. Taken by their cover art, I began to acquire copies of Engei shashin. I soon realized that beyond the cover art, they provided wonderful snapshots of the evolving Taishō era theater scene and an introduction for me to  newer forms of theater, such as shinpa (shimpageki - new school drama) and shingeki (new theater), where the written play itself, rather than the actors, as they are in kabuki productions, became central. Through these newer forms of theater I was introduced to the incorporation of adapted Western plays and plays based on Western literature into the theater repertoire, plays dealing with contemporary themes written by Japanese authors and the growing popularity of Japanese and Western cinema.

Assistance and Reference sources:

Assistance

With thanks to the Asian Art Forum and, in particular, I. Nagy for assistance in deciphering little known artist signatures and seals.

Artificial Intelligence tools for translation assistance*: Chat GPT, Gemini, Microsoft CoPilot

*As a general rule, all proper nouns were double checked and corrected as necessary. 

Books and Articles

The Bunraku Haandbook, Hironaga Shūzaburō, Maison des Arts - Tokyo, 1987

The Kabuki Handbook, Aubrey S. & Giovanna M. Halford, Charles E. Tuttle Company, 12th printing 1981

"The Modern Theatre: Shimpa," Benito Ortolani, appearing in The Japanese Theatre: From Shamanistic Ritual to Contemporary Pluralism, Princeton University Press, 1990, p. 233-242.

New Kabuki Encyclopedia: A Revised Adaptation of Kabuki Jiten, Samuel Leiter, Greenwood Press, 1997

Photography Layouts in Shibai To Kinema (Stage and Screen) Magazine: Theatrical Images Reproduced on Magazine Spreads by Yamato Aya 雑誌『芝居とキネマ』にみる写真レイアウトの実践 :誌面で再現された演劇のイメージ, 山本, 彩 , Osaka University Knowledge Archive https://doi.org/10.18910/89276

Online 

"Chronology of Japanese Cinema" http://eiga9.altervista.org/chronology.html [accessed 8-16-24]

Japan Arts Council Cultural Digital Library https://www2.ntj.jac.go.jp/dglib/ [accessed 11-9-24]

Japan Arts Council Bromide Search https://www2.ntj.jac.go.jp/dglib/collections/submenu?division=collections&class=bromide [accessed 8-16-24]

Kabuki 21 website https://www.kabuki21.com/ [accessed 8-16-24]

Shibusawa Shashi Database ("50 Years of the Imperial Theater") https://shashi.shibusawa.or.jp/details_basic.php?sid=14940 [accessed 8-16-24]

Shōchiku Movie Database https://www.shochiku.co.jp/cinema/database/ [accessed 11-9-24]

Shōwakan Digital Archive 昭和館デジタルアーカイブについて https://search.showakan.go.jp/ [accessed 11-9-24]

Waseda University Cultural Resources Database - Theatre Museum https://archive.waseda.jp/archive/?arg={%22advanced_search%22:false,%22institute_id%22:%223%22}&lang=en [accessed 11-9-24]

Waseda University Cultural Resources Database - Contemporary Theatrical Performance Records https://archive.waseda.jp/archive/subDB-search.html?arg={%22item_per_page%22:20,%22sortby%22:[%22%22,%22ASC%22],%22view%22:%22display-simple%22,%22pagination%22:{%22page%22:1},%22subDB_id%22:%2237%22,%22id%22:%221078521;18%22,%22advanced_search%22:false,%22search_key%22:%22%E6%A3%AE%E8%8B%B1%E6%AC%A1%E9%83%8E%22}# [accessed 11-19-24]