¡¡During a recent visit to Japan I was able to find some answers to these questions. Not only did I see an excellent exhibition featuring some old Japanese magic lanterns and slides at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, I even had a rare chance to attend a traditional Japanese magic lantern show, or "Utsushi-e". Rare, indeed - a handful of practitioners nonwithstanding, this once popular and widespread tradition has all but vanished.

Even the Japanese are not certain about the origins of Utsushi-e. Some believe that the first magic lanterns were brought to the isolated island nation in the 18th century by Dutch merchants, the only Westerners allowed to enter Japan at that time. The date of the first Japanese style Utsushi-e show is usually given as 1803, when the distinguished painter Kameya Toraku presented his creation to the public in Tokyo.

Following Toraku's example, such shows became very popular. The tradition lasted until the early 20th century, when magic lanterns were made obsolete by a novelty, cinema.

¡¡Sitting in a small theatre in the heart of Nakano, one of Tokyo's bustling neighborhood's with blinking neon lights, game arcades and crowded "mama bars", I came to think about the complex ways in which cultural traditions influence each other and merge into unique creations, such as the Utsushi-e. It certainly resembles some aspects of the Western magic lantern show, yet at the same time it is something quite different and original.

Above all, Utsushi-e was a form of storytelling. The stories were traditional, and they were interpreted in a true "multimedia" fashion - by a combination of projected images, performed music and live storytelling.

¡¡In Nakano I experienced a faithful re-enactment of this tradition. An announcer/actor appeared from time to time on the stage; on the other side there sat a musician and a singer, resiting the story-line. In-between there was the screen, made of thin Japanese paper, surrounded by a colorful, decorative frame. The center of attention, however, were the images that appeared on the screen, projected from behind.

Having difficulties to follow the stories, my attention focused on the amazing mobility of the images. Characters like Daruma streched comically their limbs. Other characters underwent transformations; a beautiful maiden who turned into a swimming dragon after her lover abandoned her. There were also all kinds of "atmospheric" effects, evoking different seasons or times of the day. The overall effect was fluid and spontaneous, almost as if the performers had been drawing with light on the screen.

After the show I was invited backstage and introduced to the devices with which all the astounding effects had been produced. They were quite simple. The magic lanterns (several of them were used simultaneously) were wooden boxes with lenses in front and light-sources inside, light enough to be carried around by the performers. The lanterns slides were in wooden frames. Many of them incorporated moving parts and fairly complex mechanisms to make the figures move.

¡¡The Utsushi-e certainly bears resemblance to the Western magic lantern show, particularly the Phantasmagoria, its most popular form in the late 18th and early 19th century. Just like in the Phantasmagoria, the magic lanterns are hidden behind the screen, making it possible to conjure up 'magic' apparitions of images. In both the lanterns are very mobile. In Phantasmagoria, they were fitted on wheels or rails, in Utsushi-e they are carried around by the performers.
Yet seeing Utsushi-e merely as a Japanese adaptation of Western influences would not do it justice. It clearly draws on other sources as well, in particular the rich traditions of Asian shadow theatre. Utsushie is an intriguing cultural mixture, which also feels unmistakingly Japanese. As a historical, yet still living "multimedia" experience it would be well worth re-introducing to the Western audiences, profiting from the current interest in media archaeology.

Erkki Huhtamo 1999
Originally published on Nokia Online Magazine