Chapter Commentaries 11

Uno is well-known for the posters he created to advertise stage productions, but that is not his only connection to theater.

He has been involved in all aspects of production, from stage settings, to costumes, to makeup, to direction, to scriptwriting. In the 1960s, he was already creating stage art for a play of Shuji Terayama, and it is said that he himself made costumes for and applied makeup to cast members. During the 1970s, he left this field, but made his way back in the 1990s, motivated by works with Dance Element. Uno was originally asked to design art and costumes, but he ended up being drawn into the fun of stage productions, working for the company on entire performances, including scripts and structures.

Perhaps drawn by the allure of creating an entire on-stage world and the joy of working with others in a shared endeavor, Uno concentrated his efforts on stage art through the 2010s. In playhouses, he painted scenery with the members of the company and applied makeup to actors. His work in theater was perhaps propelled by the passionate energy involved in a dramatic production.

Uno worked on many of the plays of Shuji Terayama, including La Marie-Vision, Les Fruits de la Passion, Le Petit Prince, and Hakushaku reijo kotakagari kikuko no nanatsu no taizai (The Seven Sins of the Count's Daughter, Kotakagari Kikuko). These might be called reinterpretations of Terayama by Uno. In these as well as at other productions in the Cocoon Kabuki series, We see Uno's interest in historical pieces, something that seems linked to his work in book and magazine binding. Indeed, it is in the theater that we have the thrill of seeing Uno's two-dimensional art filling the stage, right before our eyes.