Tag: Alexandria Nanneman

Princess Mononoke: A Masterpiece of Japanese Animation

Presenter: Annabel Winningham – Art History

Faculty Mentor(s): Alexandria Nanneman

Session: (In-Person) Oral Panel—Comics, Classics and Analysis

Hayao Miyazaki’s films are renowned for their fantastic visual complexity, cohesiveness, and heart- warming narratives. Miyazaki is able to unite oil-painting-like backgrounds with a great sense of depth and super-flat styled character to create playful, mystical, and breathtaking atmospheres. Although his art style is child-like and charming, the narratives of his work have very serious themes, and like much Japanese art post World War II, are highly influenced by westernization, industrialism, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In Princess Mononoke, he portrays a sense of nationalism with an appreciation for the traditional Japanese way of life, yet detests the influence that the modern world has had on Japanese culture, especially as it contradicts many of the basic morals of the central religion of Japan, Shinto. The focal theme of the film is environmentalism, but he dives into the complexity of this issue by also portraying the benefits that have come with western industrialization. The film depicts a seemingly unresolvable conflict between the animals and spirits of the forest versus humanity, yet by the end of the film, Miyazaki beautifully displays the harmony that can be achieved, but only after devastating conflict and disaster. The film is a warning. The final battle is suspenseful and action-pact, but the movie concludes on a deeply pensive and hopeful note. My essay is a visual, historical, and contextual analysis of Princess Mononoke.

Visual Analysis of Kōshirō Onchi’s Family of the Field from Poem no. 2

Presenter: Alivia Stiles – Business Administration

Faculty Mentor(s): Cecilia Rosenow, Alexandria Nanneman

Session: (Virtual) Oral Panel—Read, Speak and Act

Kōshirō Onchi is the father of Sōsaku-hanga, a form of Japanese print popularized in the 20th century during the Shōwa Era of Japan. Sōsaku-hanga, often considered an evolution of the print form Shin-hanga, became a global fine art phenomenon and its development as a result of increased Westernization has been explored by many scholars. This essay contributes to this conversation by additionally lacing the Western influence, particularly among cultural driving events of the 20th century like World War II and the Great Depression, with Eastern tradition and response to these circumstances. This combination provides us with a crucial insight: how these global players affected Kōshirō Onchi’s personal life and identity, thus affecting the art form of Sōsaku-hanga. This delineation is done through the examination of Onchi’s print Family of the Field from Poem no. 2, using a visual analysis to further understand historical and contextual elements presented by previous research in the field. What is indicated by this comprehensive analysis is that there is a certain balance to the contextual and historical influence on Sōsaku-hanga which occurs not only in a culmination of Eastern and Western culture, as well as global events, but also the personal impact of these elements on a single artist, which manifest clearly in the work if one knows where to look. This insight provokes us to think more broadly about what might have influenced visual aspects of a certain artistic piece.