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Japanese Dolls at Fiji Museum

English

A Japanese doll exhibition is held at the Fiji Museum. The exhibition is a collaborative effort by the Japanese Embassy in Suva, the Japanese Foundation and the Fiji Museum to introduce the Japanese culture in the country.

The exhibition includes the involvement of a Japanese doll Doctor Masaru Aoki, 65, who is here as part of the doll exhibition.

He came to repair and put the final touch-ups for the seventy Japanese dolls that would be on display at the Museum tomorrow.

The Tokyo City native has specialised in doll repairing for more than forty years and said he liked conversing with the dolls while making them.

"Before exhibiting these dolls I have been restoring the dolls and touching up their make-up while looking into their eyes and talking to them asking them how they have been."

He said the dolls that would be on display were made fourteen years back on an island in Japan.

Most of the dolls are miniature samurai, geisha, sumo wrestlers and Kabuki and Noh actors, painted and dressed in minute detail, and there are also simplistic but lovely Kokeshi wooden figures.

The Japanese admiration of dolls as an art form more than playthings is fostered by annual gatherings like Hina Matsuri (the Girl's Festival) and Gogatsu Ningy (the Boy's Festival), where craftsmanship rules the proceedings.

Japanese dolls are characterised by their serene facial expressions, achieved by carefully sculpting the outer layer of pulverised oyster shell, and the beautiful colours of their costumes, which hark back to eras of pomp and pageantry.

"The dolls that would be exhibited were created in an island of Japan in March 2000 and these dolls are used in different ways with different purposes all deeply connected with people's everyday lives."

Mr Aoki said the seventy dolls have been travelling to many countries of the world before coming to Fiji.

"The dolls go for exhibition around the world and they have just come back from Auckland, New Zealand before coming here."

He said the seventy dolls were made by different artists who hailed from different parts of Japan.

Meanwhile, doll doctor, Mr Aiko will also be visiting schools to demonstrate and provide lectures on Japanese dolls.
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