Representation of French people, as seen from 1860s Japan

theOneTrueSpoon, 2 months ago

Hon hon hon! Oui

Timecircleline, 2 months ago

She looks like she shoved a bunch of chocolate in her mouth so that she didn’t have to share when he came over to show her his watch

Steve, 2 months ago

As the French do

YungOnions, 2 months ago

So this is a Japanese drawing of French people? Interesting that they still give them Japanese style eyes. I’m guessing that’s down to artistic habit.

NoneOfUrBusiness, 2 months ago

It's not like the Japanese's eyes are that narrow either. It's more of an ukiyo (this style of pictures) thing. At the time narrow eyes were considered a sign of beauty (citation needed) so they drew eyes like this.

Kolanaki, 2 months ago

It’s funny to me how a lot of older woodblock prints and such narrow eyes are the thing, and then anime/manga comes along and everyone gets massive eyes that take up most of the face.

shalafi, 2 months ago

My wife’s half-Japanese and her eyes nearly close when she smiles. Is that what you mean by narrow?

clmbmb, 2 months ago

Like western paintings depicted Jesus as a white man with (sometimes) blond hair.

PugJesus, 2 months ago

The eyes are somewhat wider than in depictions of Japanese, but stylistic habits are hard to break.

HarkMahlberg, 2 months ago

It's also interesting how much thicker they make the eyebrows for non-Japanese, as well as their facial hair. I suppose they were trying to be accurate (or stylistic) of hairstyles at the time.

Timecircleline, 2 months ago

I think it comes down to them drawing an eye almost as kind of a symbol or representation of an eye, as opposed to drawing from model or reference to capture the actual shape.