French Vanilla

Masami Teraoka uses the format of Edo period (1615-1868) woodblock prints (ukiyo-e) to comment on the rapid infusion of American culture into postwar Japan. Here he employs the iconography of Baskin-Robbins ice cream to investigate Japan's urge to abandon its identity in favor of the more homogeneous, convenient, and tempting culture of globalization.
A courtesan overburdened with hair ornaments-stylistically derived from ukiyo-e artist Utagawa Kunisada (1786-1865)-stares intently at her melting ice cream cone. The artist wryly identifies the flavor as vanilla and labels the ice cream dare (also pronounced tare), which means "who" or "whose," a homophone of the word drip. Another double entendre is found in the pronunciation of the character under the cone's paper wrapping, shiru ("to know")-a homophone of the word juice. The woman's facial expression, something between a laugh and a cry, suggests anxiety. Sweat is breaking out on her brow, and she grabs napkins from a dispenser to catch the drips, another erotic innuendo.
The restaurant is identified on the hanging curtain (noren) as Ginzaya; ostensibly in Edo (now Tokyo); however, Teraoka's courtesan does not live in the closed Japan of that period. The cartouche to the left of this courtesan reads "East-West, people eat smelly stuff." Next to the bikini-clad body (shown from the waist down) in the upper left is written "Venice Beach is located about twenty miles from downtown Los Angeles."
This print was purchased in honor of Dr. Yoko Woodson, curator emeritus of Japanese art at the Asian Art Museum, upon her retirement in September 2009.