Check out these Japanese bromides from the collection of John Gall, co-author of Sayonara Home Run: The Art of the Japanese Baseball Card. Gall describes the approach of Japanese card artists from the 1900s until the late 1960s in his article, “Cut Through the Roaring Thunder with Your Swing!” at AIGA:
Like other delightful mutations that have come as a result of foreign artisans dipping into the American popular culture trough (i.e., contemporary, West African, hand-painted barber shop signs that depict hairstyles last seen on the ‘80s R&B stars, Boys II Men; or the surf guitar that pops up in the middle of a Bollywood musical), Japanese baseball cards take the basic idea of a baseball card and turn it into something new and uniquely Japanese.
Unfortunately from about 1970 it seems that Japanese cards increasingly imitated their blander American cousins. I wonder if there is any chance of a revival...
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