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Paper short abstract

This paper analyzes late Edo “cut-away” prints as “paper peep shows.” By framing the print as a nozoki-karakuri (peep box), I argue that the theatrical “reveal” exposes a body that is simultaneously mechanized (karakuri) and eroticized (shunga), transforming anatomy into popular spectacle.

Paper long abstract

The “cut-away” woodblock prints of the late Edo period—ranging from the Inshoku yōjō kagami (Rules of Dietary Life, 1855) to the Fubu no on o shiru zu (Realize One’s Parental Love, 1880)—are frequently categorized as tools for medical popularization. However, this paper argues that their visual rhetoric owes not only to anatomical knowledge development but also to the performative Edo popular culture. I propose that these prints function as “paper peep shows,” utilizing the theatrical logic of the misemono (shows) to stage the interior of the body as a spectacle of revelation.

Framing the “cut-away” skin as a theatrical curtain, this paper analyzes the specific nature of the body revealed by this peep-show gaze. First, I argue that the viewer is invited to peer at a mechanized body. In Rules of Dietary Life, internal organs are depicted as tiny laborers working at different jobs; in pregnancy prints, the fetus is depicted as a distinct component inserted into the womb. I posit that these prints visually treat the body as a karakuri automaton—a machine animated by a hidden “internal mechanism”—thereby engaging a curiosity that disenchants the biological interior into a system of mechanical parts.

Finally, I demonstrate that this “peeping” framework inherently constructs the interior as a desired space. By adopting the voyeuristic visual tropes of shunga (erotic prints), the medical “reveal” provides an alibi for the male gaze, conflating scientific inquiry with sexual curiosity. Ultimately, I demonstrate that by packaging the “mechanized” and “eroticized” body within the visual format of the “peep show,” these prints transformed anatomy into a performative entertainment for the urban popular imagination.