L'Art de la perruque au Japon
For a long time the hairstyles of Japanese women were a reflection of the fact that they belonged to a group: they varied according to age and social and family status. In ancient Japan, the ladies of the court wore their hair long, whereas peasant women concealed it under a headscarf. Then, during the Edo period (1603-1868), a time of peace and prosperity, artisans gave their imagination free rein and conceived veritable architectural creations (1) for women of the aristocracy. The hairstyle became an object of fantasy, and a fetichist cult sprang up around its gestures and ornaments, of which the grand masters of printmaking, like Utamaro, became the illustrators. These complex hairstyles, which took a long time to achieve, imposed all kinds of constraints on the women who wore them.
During the Meiji era (1868-1911), as Japan gradually opened up to the West, hairstyles became simpler. Women tried to become emancipated in a society which only allowed them the role of wife and mother. Even today, Japan is trying to have tradition and modernity coexist.
As this 1961 account shows, the traditional wedding requires the bride to have a "tsunokakushi" headdress, a rectangular hat in white silk which covers the forehead and is worn like a wig. This headdress is supposed to veil the horns of jealousy, narcissism and egoism of the woman, and it symbolises her promise to become a docile and obedient wife. This heavy headdress obliges the woman to bend her head during the ceremony and seems to maintain her submissive position.
But the hairstyle, instead of being a sign of belonging to a group and respect for tradition, can also be a symbol of proclaiming one's difference. In Japan, the years 1990-2000 saw the Shibuya district in Tokyo turn into a centre of youthful, very liberated and certainly liberating fashion. Boys and girls wore eccentric clothing and wigs or dyed their hair blonde.
(1) Chine et Japon à fleur de tête [Printed text]: [exhibition 6 July-31 August 2005], Olliveaud-Touzinaud collection, Centre départemental de documentation pédagogique de la Charente, [Château de l'Oisellerie, La Couronne, Charente] / [catalogue by Catherine Olliveaud].
