![]() ![]() ![]() Bloodsoaked bandages and ripped teddy bears made for popular accessories. Occasionally, wannabe Guro Lolita simply sliced up a cheap petticoat and splashed the distressed dresses with red acrylic paint for a bloody look. The brands that made these alternative Lolita pieces varied in size and were often subsets of larger companies seeking to cash in on the trend. represented a growing sect of Japanese youths that sought anathema to Japanese pop culture’s predilection towards the overtly feminine.Ī variety of Tokyo brands and boutiques catered to both mainstream and alternative Lolita styles - Alice and the Pirates and Maxicimam specialized in goods that darkly reimagined Lolita style and thus catered to the likes of Goth, Punk and Guro Lolita. Mori Chack’s Gloomy Bear cartoon combined cute characters with overt violence and gore These subversive works inspired Guro Lolita, which undercut Lolita’s cloyingly sweet focus with guro detailing. Chack’s Gloomy Bear manga starred a cute-looking bear that bloodily mauled its human owner, while Okayu’s Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan balanced its slice-of-life storyline and charming characters with brutal executions of the male lead. Meanwhile, later artists like Masaki Okayu and Mori Chack blended this gory art with more familiar cutesy manga. Guro manga was a natural evolution of the Ero-Guro (“erotic grotesque”) art movement founded in 1930s Japan, blending sexual elements with gross-out imagery and scenes of intense violence. These younger artists added in body horror, supernatural themes and even the rare bit of black comedy, creating a disturbing genre of manga dubbed guro manga. In the late ’80s, Ito and other artists like Suehiro Maruo began publishing dark, gory comics that built on horror tropes established by forerunners like Kazuo Umezu. Guro (“grotesque”) manga artists like Junji Ito, described by Guillermo Del Toro as “The David Cronenberg of manga,” played a role in the formation of Guro Lolita. These girls appreciated visual-kei music, a theatrical reinterpretation of nu-metal and hard rock, and enjoyed Takashi Miike’s films as much as they did Sailor Moon. The movement represented a growing sect of Japanese youths that sought anathema to Japanese pop culture’s predilection towards the overtly feminine, the sugary sweetness put forth by slice-of-life anime, J-Pop groups and Hello Kitty merch. Guro Lolitas styled their black dresses with splashes of fake blood and accessories like bandages or fake eyeballs - a stark contrast to the saccharine sweetness preferred by traditional Lolitas. Punk Lolita & Goth Lolita emerged as a natural counter, which led to smaller splinter movements like Guro Lolita. By the turn of the century, many sought an alternative to the pristine, ultrafeminine coordinates worn by most Lolita. The younger Lolita added layers of colorful petticoats, ornately-detailed bags and time-consuming makeup. ![]() Influenced more by Alice in Wonderland than Vladmir Nabokov’s Lolita, the early days of Lolita saw girls modernizing Rococo and Victorian clothing into an understated, everyday style of dress, later generations began to femininize the style. One of the more bizarre mutations was a style dubbed “Guro Lolita,” partially born of a fusion of erotic and grotesque imagery known as the Ero-Guro art movement. In the early 2000s, a host of offshoot styles emerged, including Punk and Princess Lolita. The formation of the style may be traced to the ‘80s, but the styles as it’s recognized today developed in the late ‘90s. Ostensibly a form of social-driven dress-up more than a proper fashion movement, Lolita outgrew its Japanese roots in the past two decades, finding fans around the world. ![]() Perhaps one of the most impenetrable Japanese trends to ever find a foothold outside of the country, Lolita fashion is a subculture wherein young women employ feminine takes on austere Victorian clothing, layering up in heavily stylized, accessorized outfits and joining groups of similarly-dressed friends to shoot photos, curate tea parties and go shopping. In this series, we aim to document oft-underappreciated Japanese subcultures, shedding light on relevant elements of Japanese society that have yet to receive deserved attention. Ranging from countrywide crazes to online-only collectives, Japanese society’s unique blend of borrowed cultures is a breeding ground for distinctive trends, some with longer shelf lives than others. Although articles have been dedicated to topics ranging from Shibuya-Kei music to certain niche Japanese subcultures have yet to receive proper attention. Considering the size of the country, it’s impressive how much Japan has influenced the rest of the world Japan’s technology, video games, cars, anime, food and music has permeated the collective consciousness of the planet. ![]()
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