Angura

Angura (アングラ), also known as the "Little Theater" (小劇場, shōgekijō) movement, was a Japanese avant-garde theater movement in the 1960s and 1970s that reacted against the Brechtian modernism and formalist realism of postwar Shingeki theater in Japan to stage anarchic "underground" productions in tents, on street corners, and in small spaces that explored themes of primitivism, sexuality, and embodied physicality. The term "Angura" was an abbreviation of the Japanese phrase "underground theater" (アンダーグラウンド演劇, andaaguraundo engeki).[1]

Major figures in the Angura movement included Shūji Terayama, Jūrō Kara, Makoto Satō, Minoru Betsuyaku, Yoshiyuki Fukuda, and Tadashi Suzuki.[2] Renowned graphic artist Yokoo Tadanori produced numerous promotional artworks for Angura productions, and helped co-found the Angura theater troupe Tenjō Sajiki.

  1. ^ Kapur, Nick (2018). Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 208. ISBN 978-0-674-98848-4.
  2. ^ "Glossary of Japanese Modern & Contemporary Theatre". Tokyo Stages: Japanese Contemporary Theatre and Performing Arts. 9 July 2014. Retrieved October 15, 2020.