PEOPLE
1. Write at least three things that you take away from the article. These should be major, significant points that you found to be thought-provoking and/or helpful in analyzing and understanding Beato's photography.
Beato was unafraid of setting up the exact scene he wanted to create. From the battle scenes he was first famous for to catering to the tastes of foreigners in Japan, everything in the photo was posed in a strategic manner to evoke all kinds of feelings from disgust to quaint admiration. In this way, he could paint Japan as whatever picture he wanted: intriguing, primitive, and even savage or barbaric.
Alongside creating the entire scenes himself, he also worked with others to contrive unique captions for each photo. At a glance these captions would appear to be a wonderful way to learn about the photographs and what is going on, as well as learn about Japanese life and culture itself. However, because there are many errors and misconceptions within these captions, many times theses albums only served to widen the gap of misunderstanding that already existed as well as give birth to a multitude of stereotypes that still exist today. The captions typically contained the author's opinion, and could be downright derogatory, blatantly racist, and overall exude an air of ignorance that tended to hang around western society as a whole at this time in history.
An extensive amount of care and artistry went into the binding of the albums. The covers themselves were a work of art apart from the photographs they protected. I often wonder if the album covers were bland or cheap, would the photo albums be as popular? Many times people buying photos today (hahaha, people buying photos today, that's rich) end up getting just the prints of what they want and skip out on extras. That's also because they often run the buyer a lot more money to have a finished product. I wonder about the price ranges of Beato's albums--what sort of people had accessibility to these works? While investing in photos itself is a practice typically reserved for people who had extra money to play with, was there a way for people who were less fortunate to get their mitts on one or two photos to share with their family and friends?
2. With reference to some of the concepts you acquired from the article, copy two photographs from Beato's album into a post on your personal blog and present your analysis. You should give as detailed an analysis as possible, but put an emphasis on your analysis of the "gaze" as it relates to the article, including "the non-Western subject's gaze," but also including "the reader's gaze," as well as any other gazes that you find relevant.
I'd like to start off by analyzing this photo of "Girl Playing the Shamisen". The photo features a Japanese woman playing the shamisen while seated on what looks like a clothing trunk. The room she is in appears to be meticulously arranged, with shelves containing bowls in the back and a teapot on a tray next to her. The irony in the photo is that the room seems entirely too cluttered to be putting on a performance or even practicing. What's more is normally she would be seated on the floor while playing. It seems a little unnatural to me that she is seated in such a western way when the rest of the photo is trying so hard to be as Japanese as possible, at least in Beato's eyes. Finally, it doesn't even look like she is playing but tuning. The most cringe worthy aspect of this photo, however, was entirely the caption. Obviously written from a western perspective, the explanation of what was going on was entirely condescending and ignorant. It describes the shamisen as a "simple instrument" comparing it to a guitar. The worst comes with the critique of the music the player produces; the sound of the instrument is described as wild and harsh, and the voices of the Japanese people are said to be 'by no means pleasant to the ear'. The caption also comments the place of women in society as always learning music, but then turns around to talk down to the masters, as if to say, 'what a shame, these people work so hard and even still their music and culture is so primitive that even masters of the art sound awful and disgusting.'
Another gem I'd like to analyze is "Fencers". Ha. This is another prime example of the author of the caption not knowing what they're talking about and just writing whatever they see fit. While I am not familiar with kendo and all the rules, I am confident I can tell the difference between kendo and fencing. However, after reading the caption, it seems as if westerners have just assumed that kendo was their childlike attempt at something sophisticated like fencing. The caption also included bits about some payers losing their temper and resorting to grappling, giving off the same impression of believing the Japanese to be barbaric and in need of western control. The caption os synonymous to the other photo I discussed in that it does a wonderful job of perpetuating stereotypes about the Japanese being below westerners in some way, and that their attempts at art and production are quaint and primitive at best.
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