Physiognomy as theoretical background of proto-comics

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26370157
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Art at large
• Research Institution: Tohoku University
• Principal Investigator: MORITA NAOKO 東北大学, 情報科学研究科, 准教授 (40295118)
• Co-Investigator(Renkei-kenkyūsha): MORIMOTO KOICHI 東北大学, 大学院文学研究科, 教授 (20182264)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 観相学 / 絵物語 / テプフェール / 語り

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Our research aims to examine the influence of the old science called “physiognomy” on the foundation of a new narrative medium of the 19th century in Europe, later called “comic strips”. First, we investigated how a Genevan writer Rodolphe Topffer (1799-1846), today considered as the father of the comic strip, made use of the concept of physiognomy to theorize his method of character drawing. The possibility of telling a story by drawing the same face hundreds of times was his great finding, but was also, we showed, a result of prevailing physiognomic interests in theoretical writings on painting, acting and rhetoric in the 17th and 18th centuries. We emphasized that the contradictory aspects of a facial expression, namely, the fact that a face can reveal or conceal the person’s inner life, were often explored in arts or in books of manners in the same period.

Free Research Field

人文学