DRAMATIC IMPRESSIONS
JAPANESE THEATER PRINTS
From the Gilbert Luber Collection

March 17—May 6, 2007

This exhibition places the works produced between 1916-1929 of Shunsen
(1886-1960),a brilliant designer of woodblock portraits of Kabuki Theater actors
in the context of prints created as much as a century earlier in Osaka. By focusing on representations of theater and actors, early modern printmakers developed a vocabulary of visual forms recreating the effects of staging, pose, make-up,
and costume.

Guest curated by Frank Chance, Associate Director of the Center for East Asian Studies, and Julie Nelson Davis, Assistant Professor of the History of Art,
with support from the Luber Foundation.


Ashiyuki, Sawamura Kunitarô, Arashi Kitsusaburô, and Asao Gakujurô, ôban triptych

Acting Modern:  A Symposium for the Exhibition Dramatic Impressions  
Saturday, March 31, 2006                       
Logan Hall 17
University of Pennsylvania

The Center for East Asian Studies and the Department of the History
of Art are also co-sponsoring a symposium to be held March 31, 2007 in conjunction with the Dramatic Impressions Japanese Theatre Prints exhibition from March 17–May 6, 2007. The papers will engage issues concerned with Osaka print production and subjects; the Shin-hanga revival of woodblock printing in the early twentieth century; the 1923 Great Kantô earthquake; and Kabuki in the twentieth century; among others.  There will also be a collector’s and curators’ forum on the exhibition.   Speakers will include:  C. Andrew Gerstle, SOAS, University of London; Sarah Thompson, MFA Boston; Kendall Brown, CSU Long Beach; Gennifer Weisenfeld, Duke; Shirley Luber, Philadelphia; and Yoshie Endô, Frank L. Chance, and Julie Davis from the University of Pennsylvania. 

Shunsen Prints