I am Yoshida, president of Yamada Shusei Ltd., a professional apparel garment repair group in Nagaoka City, Niigata Prefecture.
Ojiya City, where I was born, has its own unique cultural tradition of decorating rooms with ukiyoe paintings called egami. More than 6,000 pieces of Egami have been identified in the city, which is recognized as a city-designated folk cultural asset.
The “Egami and Ojiya Hiina Festival,” an event to recreate this culture, was held at 26 locations in the city until March 9. At each location, there were exhibitions of Egami and hina dolls, lectures, Japanese instrument performances, and other events.
Ukiyo-e prints created between the Edo and Meiji periods came to be displayed at Ojiya's Doll Festival because merchants who traveled between Edo and Echigo brought back ukiyo-e prints depicting the latest fashions in Edo as souvenirs and distributed them to local people.
As times changed, this culture declined, especially during the period of rapid economic growth, when the Doll Festival was moved to March 3, and the number of households decorating with egami decreased.
In addition, the Chuetsu Earthquake of 2004 threatened to destroy a large number of egami.
However, thanks to the efforts of local people, reconstruction events have been held and activities to preserve and pass on egami have continued.
