Author: Hikifuda.
Title: Hikifuda of a woman driving a motor car.
Description: n.p. [1912]. Colour woodcut 53x37cm. Old folds, rumpling and a couple of small repairs. ¶ A while ago I offered a 1914 printed hikifuda something like this and asked whether anyone had seen an earlier picture of a Japanese woman driving a car? Now the answer is: I have. Cars and planes were the password for modernity through the Taisho, especially in advertising like this, but sleek women were driven by sleek husbands or chauffeurs. This is radical stuff. It's not until well into the twenties that women behind the wheel became common. Common but not really acceptable. Cars were driven by Mogas - modern girls - louche young women with bobbed hair and short skirts: flappers. The history of early Japanese women motorists, in English, is blank. Can some expert out there help? These hikifuda - small posters or handbills - were usually produced with the text panel blank. The customer, usually a retailer, had their own details over printed. In this case it was Tamachi Taya of Kaneko-mura. The handy calendar is for 1913.

Keywords: graphic art advertising posters hikifuda c20th Japan Asia modernism women feminism transport automobiles motor cars motoring