Bome vs Docomodake

I caught a couple of exhibitions last week, one by chance and the other less random; but both were linked by the fact art in Japan these days often has its roots deeply buried in corporate-pop-culture. We probably we have Takashi Murakami to thank for this. Him and his grand Superflat theory—that Japanese don't traditionally make distinctions between "high" and "low" art—have sure made it easier for artists and corporations to come together and produce art for the masses. Populist, fun art that seems easy to understand. But art that doesn't challenge the viewer too much. Branded, corporate art that sells for a fortune; but with copies mass produced to sell in toy stores. Art that's given away with a mobile phone. It's art for everyone, but no one in particular.



I stumbled across the first exhibition in Shibuya when I noticed a bright pink poster advertising a show by BOME—who can most simply be described as a sculptor; a very otaku sculptor. In Japan Bome is best known for his sexy three dimensional figurines of anime-style girls, including the Monseiur BOME series of collectible figurines from Kaiyaido. These are sexy dolls for pervy boys; of big-busted babes with ridiculously long legs. They're the 6 inch girlfriends of otaku (to quote Patrick Maccias). And they seem almost, how can I put this? Possible.

Bome's skill is taking the absurd proportions of women in the two-dimensional world of anime and manga, and transforming them into glorious, eye-popping 3D. This is why he has so many fans; because he has overcome what otaku call the "three-dimensional contradiction" that the girls who exist on the pages of manga could not possibly exist in the real world. The weight of their breasts alone would mean the poor girls' backs would give out! But somehow, Bome's figures pull it off and the illusion of possibility is what makes these dolls such a tease. This skill is also what caught Takashi Mukrakami's eye many years ago.

With the help of Murakami, Bome's work has managed to emerge from the dark geeky ghetto of figure-collecting otaku into the glare of the international art world. And ever since 2003 when his 1997 collaboration with Murakami—a sculpture called "Miss ko2 (Project ko2)"— fetched US$567,500, the highest price ever paid for a piece of contemporary Japanese art at the time, Bome has been known overseas as an artist to keep an eye on. The show at Parco Factory is billed as the 10th anniversary of the artist's debut into the contemporary art scene, but it's essentially a show for otaku. Many of Bomes original figures are on display, and from his most early work in the 1980's to the most recent work it's fascinating to see the development of his technique. There are videos showing interviews with him and there's a detailed, step-by-step display of how he makes his dolls. But the best part of the whole exhibition—and the thing that brings all the high-falutin talk of his art world connections back down to earth— is that you can buy the mass produced versions of his figures in the gift shop, for about 4000 yen each.

The second show I went to see was a much more blatant corporate art show, but one that ironically had art of a more traditional taste, and very different flavour. "How to cook a Docomodake" is a collection of work by sixteen artists who were invited my the mobile phone company NTT Docomo to produce art that was inspired by the company mascot, a mushroom called the Docomodake. The exhibition first showed in October 2007 in New York, and was a very clever way for Docomo—who are not at all well known in the US—to introduce both their brand and their popular mascot. In Tokyo the character needed no introduction and the show was still packed when I went to see it on the closing day.


Essentially all the artists involved had deconstructed the well known character and presented it in their own way. Rika Eguchi, presented the Docomodake served up as if cooked in different ways, grilled, sliced, diced and rather over-cooked. This work was the most "cute" of all the work there, but not the best. My personal favourites were the detailed, psychedelic, pencil drawing by KYOTARO entitled "The Sleeping Forest" and of course "Yokai - Japanese Ghost - Dokomodake" by MUSTONE (pictured above). I also really liked the jacket and skirt by ANREALAGE, who has taken apart hundreds of stuffed Docomodake toys, including the small "screen-cleaner" versions that hang off people's mobile phones, and sewn them together to make his patchwork fashion (below).



Both these exhibitions could be criticised by a more serious art critic for being shallow, and vapid extensions of a post-modern society that doesn't quite know how to stop feeding upon its own pop offspring and start producing meaningful art again. But I liked it.

"BOME" The 10th Anniversary exhibition Debut in the Contemporary Art scene in PARCO FACTORY, SHIBUYA, TOKYO runs until October 20th, 2008

How to cook a Docomodake was at the Intercommunication Center at Tokyo Opera City but ended on October 13th, 2008

Alone in Shibuya

I found a good place to sit and watch. From a seat near this bar's window, I can see Shibuya passing me by. Opposite me there's an Excelsior Caffé that I know, from personal experience—and a somewhat obsessional love of good coffee—fails to excel in café. Beside that there's an entrance to a basement bar that's advertising cheap beer. A black guy stands there, waiting for customers, and occasionally breaks into dance. Break-dancing. Moon-walking-robot-style; seriously old-school. In front of him, on the sidewalk, are three men, two black, one Japanese, and it sure looks like they are passing a blunt. The police Koban is about one hundred metres away. Next to the cheap-beer-hip-hop bar is a Zara, and girls walk by looking at the mannequins in the window. It's raining, which is when I Iove Shibuya best; wet—neon reflecting in the puddles on the street. Umbrellas up, shielding the faces of all the girls with great legs, leaving me to wonder just how wonderfully gorgeous they are. Reflected in the second floor window of the Excelsior Caffé is a Big Echo karaoke place—a big reflected echo. Other signs add an expressionistic chaos of colour to the slick wet asphalt; the "Italian Tomato Cafe Jr.," and the "Curry House CoCo" send an aromatic mixture of curry and garlic into the damp air. A girl posts a letter in a tomato-red mail box as couples walk by, and the two girls sitting next to me light two more cigarettes. They are talking about their friend, who "is so beautiful she looks like a foreigner," and I wonder about the different eye's of the beholder, as mine scan the girls out the window, and the beautiful ones are beautiful maybe because they are foreign, to me. A white guy wearing a red-and-white shell-suit is lingering near the hip-cheap-hops bar; red baseball hat worn backwards, he's trying so hard to get "down" with the black guys clustered there. He's weedy, small, dangerous in his intense desire and looks like a dealer, an East London dealer, twitching, nervous and keen. He tries to lure passing girls with his imagined ghetto charm and fails. Now he's leaning alone against a wall. Now he's alone beneath a clear umbrella. Perhaps he works cheap for the hip-hop beer. Opposite him is a smooth black gentleman in a suit-and-tie and the contrast between the two is culturally amusing. The smooth dude is emailing someone on his mobile. The girls next to me have gone. And my glass is empty.

Arcade Mania! launch party

A quick reminder that the launch of Arcade Mania! is tomorrow night (Saturday 27th) so if any of you who happen to read this blog also happen to be in Tokyo, please come along!

Here is a link to the invitation on Kotaku

Itasha

I went to COMIKE about a month ago, along with about 500 thousand others, and it always amazes me just how massive this amateur comic market is. I've been four or five times now and the manga on offer this time were the usual piles of comic-porn. Naked manga honeys assaulted and exalted by a mass of sweaty otaku. This shocked, and to be honest kind of titillated me the first time I went, but it now seems boring, and a little sad. It never seems to change. The same drawing styles. The same themes. The same cum-covered girls fighting off the same invisible, censored, phallic-somethings. And it is still mostly young women drawing and buying this stuff—which is the one thing that does still raise my eye-brows.

But in the car park this summer were a group of otaku I hadn't seem before. Standing proudly beside their cars these guys reminded me of rev-heads back home in the 1970s, who declared their machismo by airbrushing naked-chicks on their muscle-cars. The modern Japanese approach however is to splash hot-anime-babes across the bonnet to display just how much "moe" you feel.

Now moe (a key term for otaku, and pronounced "mo-ay", like Moet champagne ), is kind of a hard concept to grasp. But basically, imagine that you seriously have the hots for a girl — probably a young teen girl — and that you are literally burning up inside to express your passion. Only, that passion is coupled with the somewhat awkward, slightly embarrassing, knowledge, that the object of your budding love is... a cartoon character. And that's moe.

These otaku say that living this kind of life is somewhat painful (no kidding), so these cars have been dubbed "Itasha". "Ita"= pain and "sha"= car. It used to mean "Italian car", but they've made it their own.

Walking around the carpark the one word I kept overhearing as people looked on at these chariots of moe was "mottainai!" (what a waste!) And seeing the Mercedes with the rather cheap looking decals stuck to it, I have to agree.

p.s: roll your mouse over the image on the right....."moe!"

Yokai Mania! Arcade Attack!

I've been rather busy over the past few weeks rolling out the websites for both Yokai Attack! and Arcade Mania! But both are finished now and getting good feedback.



The launch party for Arcade Mania! will be at Cafe Pause in Ikebukuro on the 27th September. So if you are in Tokyo make sure you come. The author, Brian Ashcraft, has put the invite up on Kotaku, with a link to my site! Nice of him to call me a "wizard". I expect the job offers to start rolling in!

Yokai Attack! site
Arcade Mania! site

Kaitei Shonen Marine

I am currently editing a book on Japanese pop-culture, and keep stumbling across stuff that dredges up memories from my childhood. Which is odd considering I grew up in Australia.

The latest flashback is to a time I could swim-like-a-fish, using a special oxygen rich chewing gum to help me breathe; and how, with the help of my trusty white dolphin sidekick, I would fight off underwater baddies… I seriously used to dream of being Marine Boy.

I had totally forgotten about this cartoon, and it continues to amaze me how many of the shows I used to watch as kid were from Japan. I sometimes wonder if loving these cartoons when I was young is one of the reasons I am in Tokyo now. I am by no means an anime otaku compared to some people I know, but in the list of my favorite cartoons, there are a lot of anime. Kimba the White Lion, Kum Kum, Battle of the Planets, Speed Racer, Astro Boy, and now the recently remembered Marine Boy, were all big parts of my childhood TV-time. But it was not until I was an adult that I learnt they were Japanese.

I’m not sure why, but somehow I kind of feel I missed out on something. Maybe it’s because I see all these otaku—starting with those about ten years younger than me—who loved anime and manga so much they were inspired to learn Japanese; and I envy them a little. Perhaps in my teens if I had know Battle of the Planets came from Japan, I may have become obsessed with the place earlier. But then I wonder if my eight-year old nephew, who knows Pokemon, Dragon Ball-Z and Naruto are from Japan, will still be into anime when he is older. Or whether he will be like me, and will simply be reminded of them one day.

Yoda Attack

There's been a bit of a buzz the past few days over Facebook refusing to give a Japanese woman an account because her family name a Jedi to the same it is.

Blogs everywhere have picked up the story and even Lucasfilm posted it on their official blog.

But just who is the Facebook Yoda?

Well I am pleased to say that she is none other than Hiroko Yoda one of the authors of Yokai Attack! Which ironically enough now has a Facebook group.

So join up and rub shoulders with a Jedi.

Shoko Attack!

Anyone who watches as much Japanese TV as I do is bound to know who Shoko-tan is. She seems to be everywhere at the moment, on countless celebrity panel shows, or performing songs from her new album, or ensuring people have good manners in ads for the Promise finance company. She also has an extremely popular blog.

On one of those many TV shows she appears in, I saw that as a kid she was really keen on Yokai manga. So when I met her the other day (for an upcoming book project I will tell you about eventually) I just had to give her a copy of Yokai Attack! She seemed pretty pleased with it and even exclaimed that it would be good practice for her English.

Here's hoping she puts it on her blog!

JSG Canon Rock

I know simply posting links to YouTube vids is a lazy way to blog, but hey...

Virtual Tokyo

I was searching Google Maps today to find how to get to a restaurant for a friend's birthday (can't believe he's 50!), when I noticed that Google has just launched the Street View of Tokyo. It is pretty impressive. I mean this is a damn big city! And they seem to have pretty much covered the whole place. They even have the building I live in on there, and I live in a back street of a fairly sleepy part of town.

I'm not totally sure I feel about it yet. Part of me is going "Cool! Check this street out... over here! We can totally see how to get to that restaurant!" while the rest of me is going "Um, well. Yeah, so. What about privacy and, um, the enjoyment of not actually knowing what a place looks like before you go there? You know, the joy of discovery... in the real world!"

Hopefully these two sides of me will eventually work out their differences. Until then here is where I would take any of you the first time you come visit.Walk around if you like... or save it until you can really do it.