Ciné

Ciné was a Japanese avant-garde poetry magazine founded in 1929 by Chirū Yamanaka.^[1] In later accounts of Japanese Surrealism, it has been described as one of the media through which Yamanaka introduced and circulated Dada and Surrealism in Japan and promoted international exchange with European Surrealists.^[2]

According to a City of Nagoya profile on Yamanaka, he founded and edited Ciné in 1929.^[1] The same profile lists contributors or associated writers including Iwao Kameyama, Inagaki Taruho, Katué Kitasono, Shūzō Takiguchi, and Yukio Haruyama.^[1] In this way, the magazine formed part of the literary and artistic milieu around Yamanaka that linked Nagoya-based writers to wider avant-garde currents.^[1]

The Dalí Foundation describes Ciné as one of the magazines through which Yamanaka enthusiastically disseminated Dadaism and Surrealism in Japan.^[2] The same source states that Yamanaka established contact with figures such as André Breton and Paul Éluard and promoted international exchange among them, making his publishing activity part of a broader transnational Surrealist network rather than a purely local undertaking.^[2]

Accounts of Kansuke Yamamoto note that his interest in modernist art deepened through exposure to Ciné and the writings of Yamanaka.^[3] A later Taka Ishii Gallery biography likewise states that, after returning to Nagoya from Tokyo, Yamamoto acquainted himself with Yamanaka's poetry and with Ciné, a Surrealist poetry magazine associated with Yamanaka.^[4] In this sense, Ciné formed part of the literary pathway through which Surrealist ideas entered the Nagoya milieu later associated with Yamamoto's poetry, photography, and editing.^[3][4]

Ciné has been treated in later accounts as an early node in Japanese Surrealist publishing and as one of the foundations of Yamanaka's later activity as an organizer of international Surrealist exchange.^[2][1] Through Yamanaka's broader editorial and critical work, the magazine also forms part of the background to later Surrealist activity in Nagoya, including literary and photographic circles that would later involve figures such as Yamamoto.^[3][2]

• Chirū Yamanaka
• Kansuke Yamamoto (artist)
• Yoru no Funsui
• Surrealism in Japan
• Katué Kitasono
• VOU (magazine)

• "Webなごやゆかりの歌人・詩人 令和7年度基準 3．山中 散生（やまなかちるう）" (PDF) (in Japanese). 名古屋市. Retrieved 2026-03-16.
• "The Dalí Foundation purchases Paul Éluard poetry collection in Japanese". Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí. Retrieved 2026-03-16.
• "Kansuke Yamamoto". Taka Ishii Gallery. Retrieved 2026-03-16.