Hakata Ningyo: Fukuoka's Clay Figures and Their Hidden Undersides
For adult readers: the second half of this feature discusses figures with concealed erotic scenes. Every image shown is the clothed, display side of a figure.
Turn a Hakata ningyo upside down and you usually find clay: pale, unglazed, perhaps a maker's seal. Turn over certain others, a laughing Hotei, a sleeping cat, a pair of lovers dozing under a quilt, and you find a second scene painted where only the owner would look. Both belong to one of Japan's great clay traditions. Hakata ningyo are figures of fine clay from Fukuoka, fired low without glaze and painted by hand, celebrated since the Paris Exposition of 1900 for their faces and colour. This feature tells their four-hundred-year story and then follows them into the private room, where the old joke of the hidden picture lives on in clay. The wider family of Japanese figures is mapped in our guide to hina, kimekomi, gosho and Hakata dolls, and the hidden pieces live in our Shunga and Hidden Arts room.
| Hakata ningyo | |
|---|---|
| Place | Hakata, the old merchant town of Fukuoka, northern Kyushu |
| Material | Fine clay pressed into moulds, fired unglazed at low temperature, primed white and painted by hand |
| Origins | Clay figures from about 1600; the modern style from the 1820s |
| Name | Fixed by an award certificate at the national exhibition of 1890 |
| Recognition | Paris 1900 and 1925; designated a national traditional craft in 1976 |
| Classic subjects | Beauties, noh and kabuki actors, children, warriors, lucky gods |
| Private branch | Figures with a concealed erotic scene on the underside or inside |
Bridge: a craft that has made saints for European churches and robots for an anime film is the new Japonisme in miniature, a story we set out in our manifesto on the new Japonisme and Japan's soft power.
A port city and its festival
Hakata faces the continent. For centuries it was a trading port linking Japan with Korea and China, and in 1600 it gained a castle town beside it when the warlord Kuroda Nagamasa was moved to the province and began building Fukuoka Castle. Fukuoka became the samurai town; Hakata remained the merchants' town; the two grew into one city. The craftsmen gathered for the castle, roof-tile makers, potters and carvers among them, are where every version of the Hakata ningyo story begins.
The town also had a festival. Every July the Hakata Gion Yamakasa carries decorated floats through the streets, their tiers crowded with dolls of warriors and heroes made by specialist doll-makers. The floats are built of wood, but their doll-making traditions are thought to have strongly influenced the clay figures, and one of the founding families of Hakata ningyo descends from a school of float-doll makers. In 2016 the festival was inscribed, with other float festivals of Japan, on the UNESCO list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity. Today's leading makers still make dolls for the floats.
Three founding stories
Ask in Fukuoka who made the first Hakata ningyo and you will hear three names. The oldest story concerns a roof-tile maker, Masaki Sōshichi, who came to the province in 1600 as tile-maker to the new castle and fired small clay figures from the leftover clay as a gift for the lord. A second family, the Shirouzu, came from the school of Yamakasa float-doll makers. A third, the Nakanoko, were potters in Hakata in the 1600s before turning to clay figures.
The encyclopaedias tell a combined version. In the Bunsei era (1818 to 1830), in the time of the fourth Sōshichi, a doll-maker called Nakanoko Kichibei, a friend of the Masaki family, applied the techniques of their pottery to clay figures and is counted the founder of the modern Hakata ningyo. He learnt carving from a master woodcarver, obtained permission from the domain to make toy dolls, and in 1850 sold large painted festival dolls and warrior figures with great success. More recent research, summarised in the reference works, leans towards a combined origin in the Nakanoko and Shirouzu families and doubts any technical collaboration with the Masaki tile workshop, whose methods were a closely guarded family secret. The older folk figures, called Ko-Hakata, are still made by Kichibei's successors in the city of Kasuga. Their best-known model, a young warrior holding a monkey, was kept as a charm against smallpox for children.
The name came later than the craft. When figures from Hakata were shown at the third National Industrial Exhibition in 1890, the award certificate described them simply as "Hakata ningyo", and the name spread from there. On that reckoning the Hakata ningyo is about 200 years old as a craft and about 400 years old as a line of clay work.
How a figure is made
The material is simple; the work is not. A Hakata ningyo is made of fine-textured clay from around Hakata. The maker models an original in clay, takes a mould from it, presses soft clay into the mould to form a hollow figure, dries it and fires it at a low temperature without glaze. The fired figure is coated with a white ground and then painted entirely by hand. In the older method the moulds were themselves fired clay and the white ground was gofun, made from crushed shells; modern workshops take plaster moulds from the original while it is still damp.
One detail matters to collectors. Chemical paints were originally forbidden in the process. They were permitted in the early Showa era, when export orders demanded volume that shell-white painting could not supply. Today the reference works note that everyday figures are usually finished with chemical paints and the finest with gofun, which is regarded as the true traditional finish. For the techniques shared with other Japanese figures, see our page on okimono, objects made to be placed.
| Step | Older method | Modern method |
|---|---|---|
| Original | Modelled in clay, dried or fired | Modelled in clay |
| Mould | Soft clay pressed over the original, then fired | Plaster cast from the damp original |
| Forming | Clay pressed into the mould; hollow inside | The same |
| Firing | Low-temperature, unglazed | The same |
| Ground | Dipped in gofun shell-white | Gofun, or chemical white since early Showa |
| Painting | By hand | By hand |
A short film from the national showcase for traditional crafts follows a maker from clay to finished face. Look closer at the brushwork on the eyes and hairline: it is the last step and the one that gives each figure its expression.
From toy to exhibition piece
The late nineteenth century turned a souvenir into an art. After the 1890 exhibition, Hakata figures went to the Paris Exposition of 1900 and caused a stir. A present-day maker recalls that the work shown there was so admired that requests followed from all over Europe, particularly for statues of saints for churches, and that figures of Joseph and Moses made by his father and grandfather still stand in European churches. Between 1910 and 1913 a Hakata workshop made a celebrated set of "dolls of the world", costumed figures of the peoples of the world produced as teaching models with leading anthropologists as advisers; the set is now in the University of Tokyo's museum.
The decisive change was in training. The master Shirouzu Rokusaburō studied colour theory, human proportion and modern art under the oil painter Yada Isshō, and his figures became more realistic. His pupil Kojima Yoichi (1886 to 1970) took the craft to the Paris exhibition of decorative arts in 1925, where his figures won a medal, and fellow pupils won others. Kojima's "Three Maiko", long lost, resurfaced in 2019, and a bronze copy stands beside the river in central Fukuoka. The family of related Japanese doll traditions is surveyed in our ningyo guide, and the shelf is our Japanese dolls collection.
The classic genres
Hakata makers sort their work into genres, and knowing them helps you read a figure. Beauties, bijin-mono, are the genre most associated with Hakata, and their faces change with each era's ideal. Noh and kabuki figures follow the stage. Children, warabe-mono, are where makers try new expressions. Lucky figures include the gods of fortune, Ebisu and Daikoku among them, and the comic household gods Fukusuke and Ofuku. There are warriors, festival dolls for the doll and boys' festivals, Buddhist and Taoist subjects, toys and figures of the zodiac.
| Genre | What it shows | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Beauty (bijin-mono) | Women in the dress of their era | Seated woman in a maple robe, attributed to Inoue Akiko |
| Stage (noh and kabuki) | Actors in roles and dances | Kagami-jishi lion dancer with white mane |
| Tea and daily life | Customs and pastimes | Yoshitake Kuniaki, tea ceremony figure |
| Buddhist subjects | Bodhisattvas and saints | Monju Bosatsu, attributed to Nakamura Engai |
| Nature | Birds and animals | White heron, attributed to Nakano Chikao |
| Couples and old age | Domestic tenderness | Aki no hi, an elderly couple |
The Nakamura Engai of that attribution was a designated holder of intangible cultural property in Fukuoka Prefecture and father of the present head of the Nakamura workshop. The lucky gods are introduced on our page on the Seven Lucky Gods.
Souvenirs, boom and designation
The war and the occupation that followed made Hakata ningyo famous abroad in a new way. American soldiers stationed in Japan between 1945 and 1952 bought the figures and took them home as souvenirs, and exports followed. The same demand encouraged factories to make figures of lesser quality, and the reference works are frank that quality suffered at the bottom of the market. It is the same story as the souvenir jacket, told in our history of the sukajan.
The high-growth years of the 1960s brought a second boom. Makers produced great numbers of figures of dancers in classical dress and actors of noh and kabuki, and the figures came to stand for Japanese beauty itself, giving rise to the saying "as beautiful as a Hakata ningyo". In 1976 the Minister of International Trade and Industry designated Hakata ningyo a traditional craft, and figures from member workshops can carry the craft association's seal of that designation. For the policy side of the same story, see our essay on what happened to Cool Japan.
Makers today
The craft is alive and surprisingly open. Nakamura Shinkyo, born in 1957 and the third generation of a workshop founded about a century ago, trained in sculpture, studied with masters of doll-making, ceramics and noh masks, and has won the major national craft prizes. In 2011 he presented Pope Benedict XVI with a figure of Itō Mancio, one of the four young Japanese envoys who reached Rome in the 1580s, and in 2019 he presented Pope Francis with a figure of another envoy, Nakaura Julião. He also makes dolls for the Yamakasa floats and helps restore float festivals nationwide.
"At Nakamura Ningyo, there are no rules at all that must be followed, not even for methods, techniques or subjects."
His subjects run from gorillas at the zoo to heart-shaped postboxes, and in 2021 he made figures of the robots of the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion for the release of the final film. He prefers that the figures be called ningyo, "human shape", rather than dolls. That range, from a papal gift to an anime robot, is the reason Hakata belongs in any account of Japan's soft power; the anime side of the story is in our glossary of anime, manga and games.
The hidden underside
The private branch of the craft is the one our collectors ask about most. A figure looks entirely respectable from every side but one. Underneath, or inside a hollow base, the maker has modelled or painted an erotic scene in the manner of shunga, Japan's "spring pictures". Collectors and dealers call such figures ura-e, "reverse pictures", or simply hidden shunga; the clay versions are made by the same pressing, firing and painting as any Hakata figure, and many are Hakata-style rather than from named Hakata workshops. A Japanese collection catalogue published in 2012 gathered such objects, sleeping cats among them, under the booksellers' old code word wajirushi, the "wa mark" for laughing pictures.
The idea is much older than clay figures. Edo erotic pictures were called warai-e, laughing pictures, and the humour of the hidden scene is the point: the polite surface, the private reverse and the moment of discovery when the figure is turned over. The same game is played in netsuke and lacquer, as our page on netsuke, inrō and sagemono explains, and in printed books with lift-flaps. Our flagship feature on shunga, Japan's spring pictures tells the full story of the pictures themselves, and our guide to harubon, shunpon and enpon explains the words.
A bestiary of secrets
The disguises are chosen with wit. A laughing god of good fortune, a sleeping cat, a cheerful round-faced woman and a pair of lovers asleep under a quilt all carry meanings of their own, and the hidden scene turns each into a pun. The sleeping cat borrows the famous carving at the Tōshōgū shrine at Nikkō, made for the shrine's eastern corridor in 1636 and traditionally attributed to the legendary carver Hidari Jingorō; it has been read as an auspicious image and, with the sparrows carved on its reverse, as a picture of peace. A cat that sleeps above a scene of lovers is a cat that sees nothing, which is the joke.
| Figure | The disguise | Where the secret is |
|---|---|---|
| Urasaki Hakata ningyo of an oiran | A courtesan with a tattoo motif, about 10 by 15 by 11.5 centimetres | A concealed scene, as on the classic ura-e figure |
| Lovers at the kotatsu | A couple at the heated table, one with a book open | The underside; the figure travels in a red lacquered chest |
| Sleeping lovers, crane quilt | A couple asleep under a quilt with a white crane | The underside of the quilt |
| Hotei okimono | The laughing god in a black robe with a leaf fan | Lovers asleep in the hollow base |
| Sleeping cat okimono | The Nikkō sleeping cat, in the manner of laughing pictures | The base |
| Laughing Daruma | The weighted figure of the Zen patriarch, laughing | Inside a small container |
| Otafuku in cast iron | The round-faced emblem of good cheer | A relief on the base |
| Courtesan in a peony kimono | A Hakata-style clay courtesan | The underside |
The kotatsu itself is a clue. The heated table covered by a quilt has warmed Japanese rooms since the Muromachi period, and a couple sharing one in winter is an image of intimacy before anything else. The Hakata figure of a tattoo artist and a reclining woman plays a related game with the tattooed body, a world explored in our essay on Japanese tattoo design.
Why hide a picture in clay
Three habits of mind meet in these figures. The first is humour. Edo culture called its erotic art laughing pictures, and a figure that makes its owner laugh when turned over continues the joke. The second is the gift. Erotic books and pictures were given with a bride's trousseau, and a hidden scene in a respectable ornament is a gift that can sit on a shelf in mixed company. The third is the charm. Erotic pictures were kept in armour chests as charms for victory and in houses as charms against fire, and the gods chosen as disguises, Hotei with his belly of good fortune, the cheerful Otafuku, the self-righting Daruma, are themselves bringers of luck.
The private and the public sit side by side in Japanese homes and Japanese art, and the hidden underside is the most literal expression of that pairing we know. It is also, simply, good design: an object that rewards a second look. Our page on Hotei introduces the laughing god, and the almanac of placed figures is our okimono and statues almanac.
Collecting Hakata figures
Four questions sort most Hakata figures. Is it Hakata ningyo or Hakata-style? Genuine modern figures from member workshops carry the association's traditional-craft seal; many older and private figures are described as Hakata-style because no maker or workshop can be established. Is the maker named, attributed or unknown? We say "attributed" when a seal, box or style points to a maker but cannot prove the hand. Is the ground gofun or chemical paint? Shell-white has a soft, slightly granular bloom. And what is the condition? Unglazed clay chips at fingers, noses and hems, and our descriptions record losses, such as the thumb of the Monju figure above.
Hidden-underside figures add two more. Is the concealed scene original to the figure, or a later addition? Original scenes share the clay, the firing and the painting of the figure; later additions sit on top. And will the piece be displayed? Most were made to stand on a shelf like any ornament, which is exactly how we suggest showing them. The broader rules for placing figures in a room are in our guide to the tokonoma and the curatorial language of the tea room, and the shelves are okimono and figures and the private room netsuke table.
Timeline
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1600 | Kuroda Nagamasa arrives; Fukuoka Castle begun; Masaki Sōshichi comes as tile-maker |
| 1600s | The Nakanoko family works as potters in Hakata |
| 1636 | The sleeping cat carved at Nikkō, later borrowed by hidden-underside figures |
| 1818 to 1830 | Nakanoko Kichibei founds the modern style |
| 1850 | Large painted festival dolls and warrior figures sold with success |
| 1890 | Third National Industrial Exhibition; the certificate names "Hakata ningyo" |
| 1900 | Paris Exposition; requests follow for saints for European churches |
| 1910 to 1913 | "Dolls of the world" teaching models, now at the University of Tokyo |
| 1925 | Kojima Yoichi and fellow pupils win medals in Paris |
| Early Showa | Chemical paints permitted for export volume |
| 1945 to 1952 | Occupation soldiers take figures home as souvenirs |
| 1960s | High-growth boom in dancers and stage figures |
| 1976 | Designated a national traditional craft |
| 2011 and 2019 | Nakamura Shinkyo presents envoy figures to two popes |
| 2016 and 2021 | Yamakasa inscribed by UNESCO; Evangelion figures made |
Where the record differs
| Question | One account | Another account |
|---|---|---|
| Who began the craft? | The tile-maker Masaki Sōshichi, about 1600 | The Nakanoko and Shirouzu families; no technical link with the tile workshop |
| Founder of the modern style | Nakanoko Kichibei, Bunsei era | A wider group of makers by about 1821 |
| Kojima Yoichi in Paris, 1925 | A gold medal | A silver medal for "Three Maiko" |
| Age of the craft | About 400 years | About 200 years as Hakata ningyo proper |
| Hidden-underside figures | A Hakata tradition | Mostly Hakata-style work from many makers |
Facts first, then our reading. The 1890 certificate, the Paris showings and the 1976 designation are documented; the founding stories are traditions that scholars are still sorting. Our reading is that the craft began in several workshops at once, which is how most good things in Japanese craft begin.
Answered plainly
What is a Hakata ningyo?
A figure of fine clay from Hakata in Fukuoka, fired unglazed at low temperature, primed white and painted by hand.
Is it porcelain?
It is often described in English as unglazed porcelain or bisque, but it is low-fired clay, closer to terracotta than to true porcelain.
What does a hidden underside mean?
A respectable figure with an erotic scene modelled or painted underneath or inside, a joke continued from the laughing pictures of the Edo period.
How can I tell genuine Hakata work?
Modern member workshops use the traditional-craft seal; for older pieces, look at the clay, the shell-white ground, the painting and any maker's seal or box.
Are the hidden figures shown openly?
Only to adult collectors, and only the display side in pictures; we describe the concealed scene in words.
From Tokyo to your door
If you are looking for a particular maker, subject or hidden figure that is not on our shelves, begin a private request and we will look for it in Japan. Or walk the Shunga and Hidden Arts shelf, our best shelf for figures with a secret.
With care from Tokyo,
The Japonista Curation and Concierge Team
Further reading
- Okimono: Japan's Sculpture Made to Be Placed, the Journal pillar on placed figures and the motifs they share with Hakata work.
- Jizai okimono, articulated metal figures, for another kind of figure that rewards handling.
- Geisha and oiran, for the women behind the beauty figures.
- Kimono and textile heritage, for the robes painted on the clay.
- Netsuke, inrō and maki-e, for hidden carving in miniature.
- Laughing netsuke, for the same hidden joke carved small enough to hang from a sash.
References and image credits
- Government of Japan, Highlighting Japan: Hakata Ningyo Expressing Human Emotions (March 2022)
- Kotobank, Hakata ningyo (Digital Daijisen; Nipponica, Saitō Ryōsuke; Sekai Daihyakka)
- Wikipedia (Japanese), Hakata ningyo
- Wikipedia, Hakata doll
- Hakata Ningyo Commerce and Industry Cooperative, official site
- Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, traditional crafts policy
- Wikipedia (Japanese), Nakamura Shinkyo
- Wikipedia (Japanese), Kojima Yoichi
- Wikipedia (Japanese), Shirouzu Rokusaburō
- Wikipedia, Hakata Gion Yamakasa
- UNESCO, Yama, Hoko, Yatai float festivals in Japan
- Wikipedia, Fukuoka
- Wikipedia, Hakata-ku
- Wikipedia, Kuroda Nagamasa
- Wikipedia, Japanese dolls
- Wikipedia, Okimono
- Wikipedia, Netsuke
- Wikipedia, Hotei
- Wikipedia, Daruma doll
- Wikipedia (Japanese), Nemuri-neko (the sleeping cat of Nikkō)
- Wikipedia, Nikkō Tōshō-gū
- Wikipedia, Kotatsu
- Wikipedia, Terracotta
- Wikipedia, Occupation of Japan
- Kotobank, Warai-e
- Kotobank, Wajirushi
- Kotobank, Kachi-e
- Traditional Crafts Aoyama Square, Tewaza: Hakata ningyo (official video)
- Images: Japonista product photographs.