In Japan, hide this statue of a naked girl that I cannot see

In the postwar years, Japanese authorities installed bronze statues of nude young women in public places such as parks and libraries. These women represented freedom and peace, values ​​considered more in line with the society of the time. However, in recent years, the number of city halls deciding to remove them has increased, reports the Japanese television network FNN .

For example, the mayor of Shizuoka, in southwestern Japan, is considering relocating seven statues installed around the central station and in the grounds of the former castle. Two of them are works by the French artist Auguste Renoir (1841-1919).

“In our city, there are too many statues of naked women, and it doesn't correspond to the values ​​of our time. We should relocate them to a closed area and not a public place. It would be easier, if only to admire them,” said Shizuoka Mayor Nanba Takashi, quoted by the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper , while adding that he is a lover of fine art. He added: “[As for Renoir's works]: if I were to look at them on site, it wouldn't give a very good impression. Since it's a work of art, it's interesting to look at them in detail, but it's uncomfortable.”

According to the newspaper, which sent its reporter to the scene, her opinion is not unanimous: "The fact that they don't wear clothes has never bothered me," said a local resident interviewed by the newspaper. However, this concern about being out of step with contemporary times seems to be gaining ground in more and more town halls nationwide.

The city of Kochi, in southern Japan, even decided to remove the two statues installed in its central park in 1989; as for the city hall of Takarazuka, in the center of the archipelago, it also removed one in 2021, lists the daily Yomiuri Shimbun .

Why do these works of art bother the Japanese authorities so much? Asked about the question by the newspaper, Kikuro Miyashita, an art historian, attributes this situation to society's "increasingly critical" view of representations of the naked bodies of miners. However, since these are works of art, he emphasizes that it is appropriate "to open a debate with caution with local residents to determine whether their removal is a relevant decision or not."

According to Yoko Takayama, an anthropologist interviewed by TBS, these sculptures of young women have been installed in public places since 1951. “Before the war, equestrian statues of politicians and military personnel were found everywhere in Japan. Sculptures of women, considered symbols of peace, then replaced them. In the 1970s, art was considered to make a city richer in culture. This is how their number increased,” she explains.

The initiatives of these Japanese city halls, which risk raising criticism of censorship, are outraging artists. Seiichi Abe, a 94-year-old sculptor and author of a sculpture installed in the central park of the city of Kochi, castigates the view that “the female body is shameful or obscene.” “Clothing, on the other hand, represents social class. It covers the body aesthetically but also conceals it, ” he maintains. “I find sublime the evolution of the body as it is born and which gains in sensuality over the years.”

However, much to the artist's dismay, it was decided that his work would be removed from the park at the end of August. According to reports published by the Yomiuri Shimbun, the artist was not even notified of this decision.