Articles
Materiality, Visuality, and Phenomenology: Strategies of Reproduction in Modern Japanese Books
Abstract
This research note investigates competing strategies of reproduction employed in modern Japanese books with reference to three specific volumes. The first is the Overview of Useful Lumber (Yūyō mokuzai shōran) published in 1874; the second is an early chromolithographic publication, the Chōyōkaku Appreciations: Brocades Section (Chōyōkaku kanshō, kinshū no bu) of 1883; and the third is a deluxe facsimile of an early-modern album of treasured calligraphy known as the Verdure tekagami (Tekagami nobe no midori) from 1972. Each publication evokes the issue of sampling: tranches of wood in Useful Lumber, chromolithography in Brocades, and full-scale facsimiles in the Verdure tekagami. The research note examines changing investments in remediation across this hundred-year span while foregrounding the issue of phenomenological preservation—the way in which reproductions, copies, and facsimiles work to preserve not just the appearance but the experience of the original. This research note investigates competing strategies of reproduction employed in modern Japanese books with reference to three specific volumes. The first is the Overview of Useful Lumber (Yūyō mokuzai shōran) published in 1874; the second is an early chromolithographic publication, the Chōyōkaku Appreciations: Brocades Section (Chōyōkaku kanshō, kinshū no bu) of 1883; and the third is a deluxe facsimile of an early-modern album of treasured calligraphy known as the Verdure tekagami (Tekagami nobe no midori) from 1972. Each publication evokes the issue of sampling: tranches of wood in Useful Lumber, chromolithography in Brocades, and full-scale facsimiles in the Verdure tekagami. The research note examines changing investments in remediation across this hundred-year span while foregrounding the issue of phenomenological preservation—the way in which reproductions, copies, and facsimiles work to preserve not just the appearance but the experience of the original.