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In the pre-modern and early modern periods, portraits of the [[Emperor]] were only painted posthumously, were only used for memorial purposes and the like, and were only visible to those few who (by virtue of lineage, position, or rank) would have had access to the emperor in life. However, in the [[Meiji period]] through the early 1940s, images of the emperor were widely distributed throughout society, perhaps most famously in being posted in public school classrooms, and formed a central element of an Emperor-centered national(ist) ideology. In the post-war period, the emperor has been more visible in a variety of ways, being seen in photographs and video in news media and elsewhere.
==Pre-Modern through Tokugawa period==
==Meiji Period==
[[File:Meiji Emperor.jpg|right|thumb|250px|An [[1873]] photograph of the [[Meiji Emperor]] by [[Uchida Kuichi]]; this was one of the last photographs the Emperor ever officially sat for.]]
[[File:Goshinei.jpg|right|thumb|250px|Perhaps one of the most famous or familiar images of the Meiji Emperor, this ''go-shin'ei'' (御真影) of which copies were distributed throughout the country, is not a photograph, but an [[1889]] sketch by [[Edoardo Chiossone]].]]
The [[Ministry of Education]] began to send images of the [[Meiji Emperor]] to public schools across the country in the 1880s, and it's believed that by [[1897]] or so, there was one in every elementary school across Japan. The official documents accompanying these portraits used terminology normally associated with the actual presence of the emperor, including terms such as "departure of the imperial conveyance" (''gohatsuren'') as the images left Tokyo, and "arrival of the Emperor" (''chakugyo''), as they were received at schools.<ref>Takashi Fujitani, ''Splendid Monarchy'', UC Press (1998), 84.</ref>
The last official photographs of the Meiji Emperor were taken in [[1873]], by [[Uchida Kuichi]]; after that, the Emperor is said to have refused to have his picture taken (or, otherwise, the [[Imperial Household Ministry]] or other governmental managers of Imperial & national ideology and propaganda had it no longer take place). For this reason, many of the most famous or well-known images of the Meiji Emperor today, though perhaps widely mistakenly believed to be photographs, are in fact drawings. One such portrait was sketched by [[Edoardo Chiossone]] in [[1889]]. The ''[[yoga|yôga]]'' painter [[Takahashi Yuichi]] was also able to paint a portrait of the emperor, in [[1880]].<ref>Conrad Schirokauer, David Lurie, and Suzanne Gay, ''A Brief History of Japanese Civilization'', Wadsworth Cengage (2013), 179.</ref>
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==References==
<references/>
[[Category:Art and Architecture]]
[[Category:Meiji Period]]
