Japan offers a treasure trove of wonderful toys, including the delightful karakuri or automata. This illustration is based on a traditional karakuri toy that is still being made today by a tenth-generation craftsman from Kumamoto called Atsuga Shinpachiro (厚賀新八郎).
The toy is sold in the Kumamoto area and has its very own local legend attached to it. Around the time that Kumamoto Castle was completed by daimyō Kato Kiyomasa (1607) there was a very funny foot soldier by the name of Kinta who had a knack for making people laugh. He was known affectionately as Funny Kinta or Kinta the Clown (おどけの金太 – Odoke no Kinta).
In the mid-19th century, a local puppeteer called Nishijinya Hikoshichi (西陣屋彦七) created a karakuri toy modelled on the legend of Kinta, with a mechanism that made his eyes go back in their sockets and his tongue roll out. Atsuga Shinpachiro (b. 1943) is Hikoshichi’s descendant and the only craftsman making this toy today, following the exact same method.
Initially it was meant as a funny toy – after all, it was meant to represent a well-known jokester, Odoke no Kinta. But his ghoulish appearance, coated in gleaming red lacquer, earned it the name of Kinta the Ghost or Kinta the Eerie Thing (お化けの金太 – Obake no Kinta).
Atsuga makes around 50 of these in a seven to ten day period – they are made of papier maché and the internal workings are made with bamboo. You can watch him making one here. You can also see him in an interview here (in Japanese) talking about his work.
When I was researching Obake no Kinta, I started to think about tongues. Hidden inside our mouths, they are powerful things that allow us to talk, to taste and to feel. When we break the unspoken agreement not to show them, we mean something. We mean to break a moment, to change the tone in an instant.
Who can continue being serious after someone blows a jokey raspberry at them? They can lighten the mood, insult, or indicate pleasure – they are disruptive, and are used as a challenge of sorts in all kinds of contexts. Will you laugh? Will you recoil? Will you be scandalised?
There is something delightful about a toy that we can use and enjoy repeatedly, despite knowing the outcome.
The tongue rolls out! The eyes roll back! Do it again, Kinta.