Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
The hannya (般若) is a mask used in a traditional Japanese Noh theater, representing a jealous female demon. It is characterized by two sharp bull-like horns, metallic eyes, and a leering mouth. [1] In Noh plays, the type of mask changes according to the degree of jealousy, resentment, and anger of the female characters.
Onryō are used as subjects in various traditional Japanese performing arts such as Noh, Kabuki, and Rakugo; for example, hannya is a Noh mask representing a female onryō. [5] The Japanese people's reverence for onryō has been passed down to the present day.
Yūgen (幽玄, profound sublimity): Yūgen is a concept valued in various forms of art throughout Japanese culture. Originally used to mean elegance or grace representing the perfect beauty in waka, yūgen is invisible beauty that is felt rather than seen in a work of art. The term is used specifically in relation to Noh to mean the profound ...
Oni Mask [44] is a story where a young girl goes off to work at a ladies' house to make money for her ailing mother. She talks to a mask of her mother's face once she is done with her work to comfort herself. One day, the curious coworkers see the mask and decide to prank her by putting on an oni mask to replace the mother's mask.
The masks are worn throughout very long performances and are consequently very light. The nō mask is the supreme achievement of Japanese mask-making. Nō masks represent gods, men, women, madmen and devils, and each category has many sub-divisions. Kyōgen are short farces with their own masks, and accompany the tragic nō plays.
Author and folklorist Matthew Meyer has described the Kuchisake-onna legend as having roots dating back to Japan's Edo period, which spanned from the 17th to 19th centuries [1] but Japanese literature professor Iikura Yoshiyuki believes it dates from the 1970s. [3] In print, the legend of Kuchisake-onna dates back to at least as early as 1979.
Kyoto geisha Toshimana holding a Nōh mask, wearing full make-up and a katsura (wig). Oshiroi (白粉) is a powder foundation traditionally used by kabuki actors, geisha and their apprentices. The word is written with kanji meaning "white powder", and is pronounced as the word for white (shiroi) with the honorific prefix o-.
Okiku, Oiwa, and the lovesick Otsuyu together make up the San O-Yūrei (三大幽霊, "three great Yūrei") of Japanese culture. These are yūrei whose stories have been passed down and retold throughout the centuries, and whose characteristics along with their circumstances and fates have formed a large part of Japanese art and society.