The Living Works: Methods of Viewing Japanese Tattoos Through the Lens of the Kabuki Theater
type: CreativeWork
description: This study examines the presence of tattoos in the Kabuki theater through depictions of tattooed actors on ukiyo-e woodblock prints during the Edo period (1615–1868) in Japan. Kabuki actors regularly wore tattoos on their skin to associate themselves with the characters that they played. These tattoos included longstanding motifs of these characters created within ukiyo-e printmaking. The actor's character association drew upon the production of these images with heavily tattooed bodies and the cultural knowledge of the audience. By wearing tattoos, actors reinforced the presence of the character within the performance through a distinct visual language closely related to ukiyo-e prints. In this thesis, I argue that this way of looking and associating actors and characters can then be extended beyond the theater to view other tattooed people in social spaces. By wearing and presenting a tattoo, a person was able to outwardly express an identity, a "character," connected to socioeconomic status, gender, or virtuosity, in much the same way as the kabuki actors presented characters on the stage. Japanese tattooing has been examined primarily through the lens of sociological and anthropological study in previous scholarship. Even though there have been more art historical inquiries of tattoo imagery in recent years, especially connections between the large-scale tattoos of the Edo period to the flourishing ukiyo-e print culture, tattoo's association with another contemporaneous art form, the Kabuki theater, has not been fully explored. This thesis offers an art-historical study of tattoo imagery in relation to the two important art forms of the Edo period.Keywords: tattoo, kabuki, Japan, irezumi, performance, ukiyo-e
abstract: This study examines the presence of tattoos in the Kabuki theater through depictions of tattooed actors on ukiyo-e woodblock prints during the Edo period (1615–1868) in Japan. Kabuki actors regularly wore tattoos on their skin to associate themselves with the characters that they played. These tattoos included longstanding motifs of these characters created within ukiyo-e printmaking. The actor's character association drew upon the production of these images with heavily tattooed bodies and the cultural knowledge of the audience. By wearing tattoos, actors reinforced the presence of the character within the performance through a distinct visual language closely related to ukiyo-e prints. In this thesis, I argue that this way of looking and associating actors and characters can then be extended beyond the theater to view other tattooed people in social spaces. By wearing and presenting a tattoo, a person was able to outwardly express an identity, a "character," connected to socioeconomic status, gender, or virtuosity, in much the same way as the kabuki actors presented characters on the stage. Japanese tattooing has been examined primarily through the lens of sociological and anthropological study in previous scholarship. Even though there have been more art historical inquiries of tattoo imagery in recent years, especially connections between the large-scale tattoos of the Edo period to the flourishing ukiyo-e print culture, tattoo's association with another contemporaneous art form, the Kabuki theater, has not been fully explored. This thesis offers an art-historical study of tattoo imagery in relation to the two important art forms of the Edo period.Keywords: tattoo, kabuki, Japan, irezumi, performance, ukiyo-e
author: Kelley, Zachary William
language: en_US
language: English
keywords: irezumi, Japan, kabuki, performance, tattoo, ukiyo-e
date published: 2025
date modified: 2026-07-27T18:44:18Z
provider: University of Alabama
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Alabama Libraries