Kuroko

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Print by Utagawa Kuniyoshi of actor with three Kuroko
Kuroko behind actors on stage

Kuroko (Japanese: 黒衣, lit. "black clad")[1] are stagehands in traditional Japanese theatre, who dress all in black.

Lexical background

黒衣 is primarily read kurogo, differentiating from the other readings kokui/kokue/kuroginu "black clothes" – the go/gi suffix underlining the wearing intent. Another synonym for the stagehands was also 黒具 kurogo "black instrument" as they were meant to serve the performance. Over time the non voiced mispronounciation kuroko also started being popularly used, and needed its own spelling that took the simple 子 ko character as an ateji (sound only), making the 黒子 kuroko word. Originally though 黒子 was read hokuro and meant "beauty spot". By contamination nowadays the two readings kuroko/kurogo are both available for the two spellings 黒衣/黒子.

Description

In

props
on stage, aiding in scene changes and costume changes. They will also often play the role of animals, will-o-the-wisps, or other roles which are played not by an actor in full costume, but by holding a prop. Kuroko wear all black, head to toe, in order to imply that they are invisible and not part of the action onstage.

Colour variation

The convention of wearing black to imply that the wearer is invisible on stage is a central element in bunraku puppet theatre as well. Kuroko will wear white or blue in order to blend in with the background in a scene set, for example, in a snowstorm, or at sea, in which case they are referred to as "Yukigo" (雪衣, snow clad) or "Namigo" (波衣, wave clad) respectively. As this convention was extended to kabuki actors depicting stealthy ninja, historian Stephen Turnbull suggested that the stereotypical image of a ninja dressed all in black derived from kabuki. The theatrical convention of dressing ninja characters as apparent stagehands to imply stealth and to surprise audiences contributed to this popular image, in contrast to the historical reality that real ninjas usually dressed like civilians.[2]

In Noh theatre, a kōken, wearing black but no mask, serves much the same purpose.

Examples from popular culture

See also

  • Grip (job)

References

  1. ^ "歌舞伎への誘い | 黒衣". Archived from the original on 2017-11-13. Retrieved 2008-09-10.
  2. OCLC 842879597
    . The earliest pictorial reference to a ninja in black is a book illustration of 1801, which shows a ninja climbing into a castle wearing what everyone would immediately recognise as a ninja costume. However, it could simply be that it is pictures like these that have given us our image of the ninja rather than vice-versa. It is a long-standing artistic convention in Japan, seen today in the Bunraku puppet theatre, that to dress a character in black is to indicate to the viewer that he cannot see that person. To depict a silent assassin in an identical way in a picture would therefore be perfectly natural and understandable to the contemporary Japanese viewer, and need not imply that the resulting illustration is in any way an actual portrait of a ninja.
  3. ^ Precious Archived 2009-05-29 at the Wayback Machine
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