My final project for my Japanese Aesthetics class. We were allowed to pick any topic that we covered throughout the semester. Because I love kawaii, I chose kawaii culture.
Like all popular fads, there's always a good and bad side. I wanted to focus on the "unseen" for this particular piece.
Peer pressure and suicide is very common in Japan, I've noticed. From a young age, kids are taught to study constantly to get into good schools and get good jobs. Some kids decide to pursue art careers and acting, like mangaka or working at a maid/butler cafe. There's a lot of pressure there too. If you look at idols, they are required to meet a certain "kawaii" criteria. They have to look a certain way, act a certain way, and live a certain way. There have been cases where these stressful situations have led to suicide. In the picture, the girl has nooses around her arms and legs in the shape of puppet strings. She also looks "happy", but is crying. She wears a mask over her face because she can't say anything. She can't complain about society. She has to pretend everything is okay.
One of the ropes on her wrist is being cut to symbolize self harm. A common method people use for "escaping" internal pain and pressure is by self harm. The feathers are black, "tainted" even, because even though she looks pure, she is not actually pure. Society has pushed her so far that the "innocence" she once had was lost.
There are bruised hand marks on her body because a lot of the time, kawaii culture is sexualized. "Kawaii" girls are portrayed as "cute", "innocent", "naive", almost child-like. Like something that's easy to take advantage of. There have been many cases in which idols and maids working at Maid Cafes have been molested by their fans and customers.
I also incorporated a menhera vibe to it. The rest of the image should speak for itself, but I think I got most of the main point across. I love Japanese culture and I love the kawaii aesthetic. I love kawaii fashion and cute things, don't get me wrong. The class assignment is to analyze this topic and look a deeper meanings.
I used a mix of manga screen tones and traditional media! The quotes are from Vocaloid songs, "Rolling Girl" and "Drowning in a Wave of Sadness".
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