Japanese popular art as text advertising's clues to understanding the consumer

We must be concerned with our choices of methodology when we are trying to understand a culture. Art, because it is a way of expressing collective values and norms, is available for researchers attempting to gain an understanding of a culture. Thus art becomes text - conveying a message regarding the culture. Japanese art is used to assist in the understanding of the often surprising phenomenon of a greater than expected use of sex and violence in Japanese advertising and other popular visual art forms. It is posited that, consistent with what is reflected in the woodblock printings of the Tokugawa period, there is still a frustration with the restrictive political and social system, that is reflected in present day popular visual arts and advertising.