Legends of Kamishibai

This week just gone, we enjoyed another visit from staff of Tokyo's National Museum of Nature and Science to Melbourne Museum, where I work. Above, with the lyrebird on his shoulder, is Yoshikazu Ogawa, our visitor and Head of the Education Division back home. The lady who the emu is looking at is one of my colleagues, Priscilla Gaff, Program Coordinator of Life Sciences. The bloke whose bum is being nibbled by a wombat is of course me, the humble Programs Ofiicer.

Yoshikazu was following in the footsteps of Koichi Kubo and Koichiro Harada, all of whom have visited Melbourne Museum since I returned from Tokyo in November 2009. He was particularly interested to talk about pre-service and on-going teacher education, which he and Priscilla discussed in detail, but I was particularly interested when he described the sort of presentations that are done for groups of pre-school children visiting the National Museum. Speaking of these, he used a Japanese word which electrified me.

And the word was this:

Kamishibai

Really? Did my ears deceive me? Turns out they didn't. (Thanks, ears!) Turns out Yoshikazu really did say, 'Kamishibai'. As in, Manga Kamishibai: the art of Japanese paper theater (sic), as in the book that my mother bought me last week (thanks, Mary Anne!) from the Paperback in Bourke Street. Kamishibai is a Japanese storytelling form where the performer presents a series of painted images, much like the storyboard of the tale, and also makes sound effects and provides character voices and the narration.

Before they began the tale, the storyteller would sell lollies to the kids who'd assembled around the kamishibai 'stage' (sometimes mounted on the back of a bicycle!), then tell the kids that week's instalment of a Golden Bat Adventure, or a thrilling episode of the life of the Prince of Gamma, who hails from Atlantis.

Last century's iteration of this tradition began in the 1920s and continued through to the early 1950s, when television brought it down.

BUT.

Those of you who know of my enduring love for both performance and comics will be able to guess how much my temples throbbed when I saw those words, 'paper' and 'theatre', used together. Kamishibai, eh? And then, to have Yoshikazu mention the very word not a week later, well frankly, it's hard for me not to detect the ring of destiny in that word.

Kamishibai.

Watch this space.

Koichi incoming!

Last Wednesday, which was a week after I'd returned from Tokyo (actually nine days but who was counting such things?) I cycled into work at Melbourne Museum with a lighter heart because I was going in to meet Koichi Kubo, from the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo. Below, I and my museum colleague Paola Luz after being showered in gifts by Koichi.

I am holding an extremely rare catalogue from Koichi's museum's exhibition of 'Moyashimon' (see my blog entry here), which Noriko Morii managed to track down for me. I am extremely interested in this exhibition, which used a popular manga as a way 'in' for audiences for an exhibition about fungi and mushrooms. Yes, I'm interested in it because it is comics/manga that provided the window through which the visitors saw this science, but even more because it's fiction though which we gain an experience of fact. As someone who makes theatre in a museum, this is a constant theme for me: bluntly, how much can/do/should you lie in the service of the truth? Although, of course, I don't think of fiction as lies any more than I think of facts as the truth.

We walked Koichi through the museum, showed him our so-new-you-can-still-smell-the-taxidermy exhibition WILD and divers other spaces in which functions (weddings, cocktail parties, corporate events) can be held - this is Paola's department. Why? Kubo-san trained as a biologist, but has been in Australia researching the way that Australian museums hire out their spaces for events, particularly after hours. A fact finding mission.

And if you're after facts at Melbourne Museum, you can't escape this one: that really, the entire gigantic place is really just ONE elaborate case for THIS collection item. Phar Lap. Well, his skin, anyway.

Bernard, Koichi and The Lap, Melbourne Museum November 2009. Photo by Paola Luz.

Sayonara, Koichi! Thanks for coming to Melbourne!

Fujiyama, finalmente!

This day dawned bright and clear and we went up topside for breakfast and were rewarded with our first view of Mount Fuji from the hotel - we had glimpsed it in between whizzing buildings on the way in on the bus last Tuesday, a decade ago, but now here it was all calm and stately, accompanying one's morning croissant. Our friend Mami works at a museum near the mountain and this sight made us think of her.

Its accompanying peak, Mount Krishna-Pillay, is actually Chris' head silhouetted in the foreground.


Another monument on Odaiba island is the lady below, a present from France.



We went and met the marvellous Noriko (one of our Miraikan friends) at Daiba station and she guided us to the Panasonic Center (sic) where we met Mister Kousuke Kinou, the manager of the RiSuPia ('ri' from the word for 'science', 'su' from the word for 'maths' and 'pia' from the word for 'place') team. This is a high-tech (as one might guess) activity zone established by the Panasonic company, like Miraikan also on Odaiba Island. I will post about this remarkable place later.

One of the many amazing things about this trip has been how honoured and welcomed we have been by each of the places we have visited. Treated with respect and care and interest. It has been quite humbling and very lovely.

Above, a mural at the Panasonic centre.

Walking back towards the Yurikamome line to catch the train into town, and then out to the National Museum of Nature and Science. That's Noriko way out front. The NMNS is the place where the mushroom manga exhibition was. When we got there, I was astounded by my reaction: overwhelmed by the pleasure of the familiar, of the recognisable, of home. A natural history museum, at last, after all these science centres!

Again, we were greeted as honoured guests by Koichiro Harada and his colleague
Noriko Morii and taken to the amazing 360 degree theater (sic), where the audience stands on a bridge through the axis of a large sphere and you watch a movie being screened above, below and all around you.

Then we ran about like a pack of schoolkids. The place was packed as today was a public holiday, National Culture Day.

This is the herb roof garden at the National Museum of Nature and Science. Hopefully, at the end of this post, there will be a little slide show/movie of the other thing you can find on the roof there.

Here's a little picture particularly for my Public Programs colleagues, particularly John and Alice: look, a touch trolley!

It's a real old-style natural history museum, and there's something extremely satisfying about that. Lots of STUFF, including STUFFED animals. The above is a picture for Tracy-Anne, who's building something similar back at Melbourne Museum.

And again for my Public Programs buddies: quite a few walking splashing whales around. Iwill blog further about the dinosaurs here, but look below for a half-slideshow about one of them.

It was then time to farewell Noriko - more tears and waving goodbye in an undergound train station. Then Mitsuru took us to Asakusa, where we visited the Senso-ji, or Senso shrine, with very many other tourists and Japanese people.

I touched the giant straw sandals hanging outside the shrine, which give good luck to those who walk.

We then went by train to Shimbashi, where we met Yuko and Hiromi who'd been at work all day at Miraikan, for a last supper.

Above, a big decoration/sculpture on a Shimbashi wall.

After which, I farewelled Yoko and Hiromi, as I won't see them again tomorrow like the others will - I will be hunting down my accomodation in Shibuya, Ryokan Fukudaya, as recommended by Scott Matthews. Thanks Scott!


Okay so here's the partial dino preview.

And here's what happens on the other part of the roof.