SAKAI, Osaka Prefecture--In helping keep a long tradition alive, three people weaved a Sakai Dantsu, or a Sakai-style “dantsu” thick carpet, on a loom. 

These artisans were paying their debt to society, as they toiled as inmates at Osaka Prison here on a recent day in early July. 

They carry the hopes of the municipal government in passing down the carpet-making technique, which was added to the prison’s  training program about 30 years ago. 

Believed to date to the Edo Period (1603-1867), Sakai Dantsu is designated by the Osaka prefectural government as an intangible folk cultural property.

The only Sakai Dantsu carpets sold to the public now are made by the three prisoners.

Two of the three convicts were working in a pair to stitch a design of famed ukiyo-e painter Katsushika Hokusai’s “Under the Wave off Kanagawa.”

They wove colorful weft threads between warp threads resembling dried “somen” thin noodles, looking at sample illustrations and working quietly.

They started working on the carpet in the spring.

The large rug, measuring 131 centimeters by 195 cm, is expected to be completed by the end of the year.

CARRYING ON THE TORCH

It is believed that dantsu carpets were introduced to Japan from the Middle East via China.

Sakai, the Nabeshima district of Saga and Ako in Hyogo Prefecture are referred to as Japan’s three major production areas for dantsu carpets.

In Sakai, a yarn merchant started selling dantsu carpets in the early 19th century.

By the end of that century, there were more than 3,000 producer families in the region to distribute dantsu carpets with a total area equivalent to 890,000 tatami mats (one tatami mat is about 1.5 square meters) a year.

At one time Sakai Dantsu rugs were actively exported to overseas markets, but the industry gradually faded over time because of the amount of work it took to produce the traditional carpets, which were sold for high prices.

In 1992, Minetaro Tsujibayashi, who was touted as the “last master,” passed away.

Around that time, the city government solicited people willing to learn the craft to create an environment and foster successors of the traditional craft.

Currently, those who learned the skills at the time weave Sakai Dantsu carpets on looms at the Sakai City Industrial Promotion Center mainly on Monday afternoons, although they are not for sale.

Successors have also grown old.

One of them, Nobuko Hosokawa, 84, said, “don’t know how long we can continue.”

Meanwhile, inmates at Osaka Prison have inherited the carpet-making techniques that are proficient enough to churn out commercial products.

Dantsu carpet production was incorporated as part of the prison’s vocational training around the same time when the city government solicited successors.

The craft has been handed down to prison officers and inmates after they learned the skills from those successors.

FUN OF CRAFTSMANSHIP

One of the two inmates working on the “Under the Wave off Kanagawa” carpet was a man in his 50s, who started weaving dantsu rugs nearly 20 years ago.

Considered to be the most skilled “artisan” at present, he works almost seven hours a day sitting in front of a loom.

Last year, he completed a tapestry based on an oil painting by Alphonse Mucha (1860-1939), which took nearly three years to complete.

He worked on “Quo Vadis” at the request of the Sakai Alphonse Mucha Museum, which is dedicated to the works of the Czech painter.

It was displayed at a recent special exhibition at the museum that ended Aug. 17.

“I’m happy if it is enjoyed by visitors,” he said.

He said he had a series of difficulties, including how to choose threads and performing detailed work, and added that he learned the fun of making things while working on Sakai Dantsu carpets.

“It is so skillfully rendered, with thin lines also expressed well,” said Toshiko Ando, 73, who taught Osaka Prison inmates the dantsu-making skills when they started learning the craft.

One of the three inmates who can weave dantsu carpets and put the finishing touches on the Mucha carpet is in his seventh year working as a carpet maker.

“I learned the importance of continued effort and perseverance,” he said.

KEEPING TRADITION ALIVE

However, while there are 12 looms at the prison, many of them remain unused.

“We are barely able to keep the skills from being lost,” said an officer in charge of prison labor.

Currently, Sakai Dantsu carpets sold to the public are limited to those on display at a showroom for products made by inmates near Osaka Prison.

Toshinari Nishinoue, 68, chairman of the Sakai Handwoven Rugs and Carpets Technique Preservation Society, said it is unlikely to see private companies making a foray into dantsu making in the future.

“It has been a major and imminent issue to decide how we should pass down the tradition,” he said.