Hokusai: An Animated Sketchbook (1978)

The influence of ukiyo-e master Hokusai (1766-1849) is pervasive in Japanese culture. Not only are his iconic images found on everything from stationary to beer mats, but I have noticed nods to Hokusai in a wide range of contemporary Japanese art. The most amusing of these is in Tabaimo's short film Public Convenience when she alludes to Hokusai's The Great Wave Off Kanagawa inher animation of waves of water flushing through a Japanese squat toilet in a public WC.
In looking for more references to Hokusai in animation, I happened upon this animation by Tony White. It won the BAFTA Film Award for Best Factual Film in 1978 and uses 60 Hokusai prints to animate this wonderful tribute to the artist who called himself the "old man mad about drawing."



There's an extensive interview with Tony White about 2D animation at Toon Zone. Tony White currently teaches full-time at DigiPen on whose website you can find a biography and list of awards he has received. White has also published books on the art of animation and he is the founder of the Animaticus Foundation which is dedicated to preserving and teaching 2D animation art.

Hokusai Manga

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008

Kon Ichikawa

I was saddened by the news that Kon Ichikawa died yesterday (Japan Times obituary). He was one of the most talented directors of his generation. I had been thinking about his work a lot recently, as I had noticed that Criterion has released DVDs of The Burmese Harp and Fires on the Plain and added them to my wish list.

I treasure my Criterion DVD of Tokyo Olympiad (1965), not only because my Aunt Marian makes a cameo appearance in it -- in one of the montages of unfortunate mishaps at the Games, my aunt is shown being carried off the track in a stretcher -- but also because it is the greatest sports documentary ever made. My Dad is a big sports fan so I saw my share of sports documentaries growing up, but none of them rivals Tokyo Olympiad in its widescreen glory. It reminded me of the first time I saw The Band's The Last Waltz (Martin Scorcese, 1978) on the big screen and was transported back in time to the event itself.

Among the extras on the DVD there is a rather oddly shot interview with Ichikawa sitting in the stands of the stadium. Ichikawa is shot in profile and he avoids addressing the camera directly. At the beginning of the interview, the odd framing and lack of engagement is distracting, but after a while he warms up a bit and shares some fascinating information about the way in which they shot the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

The best moment comes when the interviewer asks Ichikawa the obvious question: "How much were you influenced by Leni Riefenstahl's Olympia?" Ichikawa reveals that he watched Olympia repeatedly and treated it as a textbook in documentary filmmaking. He even recounts meeting Riefenstahl at a festival after making Tokyo Olympiad and shaking her hand and thanking her for making a film that had taught him so much. I wonder if he told her the truth about how her film influenced him: that he had studied the minute details of how she made her film and decided that his film about the Olympics would be the antithesis of hers. Olympia, he explained, had been made by a conquering nation, but Tokyo Olympiad was being made in a post-World War II world in a defeated nation. Olympia had depicted the Olympics as a celebration of god-like sporting champions. Ichikawa's Tokyo Olympiad is not just about the champions, but about the losers as well. It is also about the spaces in which the events were being held and it also foregrounds the spectators and the city itself. There is surely no better document of how the city of Tokyo looked in 1964 than the marathon sequence in this film.

Ichikawa transformed his Olympic documentary into a celebration of humanity in all its glory and misery, its triumphs and defeats. This is what made him such a truly great director, for in all his films he probes the difficult question of what is means to be human. For more information about the oeuvre of this director, I recommend Alexander Jacoby's article at Senses of Cinema.

A pet project I hope to do one day is to learn more about Ichikawa's wife and sometimes collaborator, Wada Natto (1920-1983). There are a lot of stories about Japanese wives who have collaborated with their director husbands (not many women have attained director status in Japan) so this may be a fruitful area of research.

Style of Kon Ichikawa - Art + CM + Animation

Japanese Movie

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008

Koichiro Tsujikawa

Koichiro Tsujikawa (辻川来幸一郎) started out in graphic design and moved into directing short films in 1999. Like most animation artists, Tsujikawa funds his work mainly by producing commercial work and music videos. He was featured in Boards as one of 20 directors to watch in October of last year for his extensive creative output for everything from commercials for big brand names to mesmerizing videos for experimental music artists. The artist he most works in collaboration with is exploratory and experimental musical artist Cornelius (aka Keigo Oyamada /小山田圭吾).

Tsujikawa’s most recent project is Kimagure Robot (きぐれロボット). It is an adaptation of a story by acclaimed science fiction writer (and friend of Osamu Tezuka) Shinichi Hoshi (星新一). The film is only available by download onto keitais in Japan in eight 5-minute installments. This short film format suits the work of Hoshi, who is famous for his short-short story style. During his lifetime (1926-1997), he wrote over a thousand short stories. Kimagure Robot has been adapted into animation before (by Studio 4C in 2004), but this adaptation seems to mix animation and live actors, a technique Tsujikawa uses often in his work.

I don't have a full review of Tsujikawa's style for you yet, as I have only recently discovered his oeuvre and he has certainly been prolific. His style ranges from stop motion to CGI. His subject matter can range from playful animation of every day objects to the surreal. This filmography is a work in progress from information I found on Tsujikawa’s official website. If you click on some of the titles below you can watch his films on YouTube. I learned about Koichiro Tsujikawa’s work via PingMag’s postings of Tsujikawa’s recent foray into audiovisual performance. You can catch the first short clip here.

Filmography: Commercials

2007

Source Smirnoff (Smirnoff)

2006

Hop Field Documentary (Sapporo Namashibori)

Haku (Shiseido)

Foma Stick (Sony Ericsson)

Twenty-Four Hour Clock (24)

Majolica Majorca (Shiseido; with music by Cornelius)

2005

Search to Discover (Goo – the One Spot Project, NTT Resonant)

Meiji Milk Chocolate (Meiji)

Group Promotion (Hitachi)

Yebisu Beer (Sapporo)

Untitled (Parco)

Untitled (Kagome)

Morinaga Choco Ball (Morinaga)

2004

Daito Giken

Ripple of a Smile (NTT East Japan)

2003

Bed Merry (Tower Records)

Filmography: Music Videos (for Cornelius, unless otherwise noted)

2008

Blonde Friendly Collie Bear (Quantine Rabbit)

2007

Like a Rolling Stone

2006

Sleep Warm

Sensuous

Fit Song

Beep It

Gum

Breezin’

Music

2005

我は行く (Mikio Hirama)

2004

Wonderword (Supercar)

Galaxy (Rip Slyme)

2003

Mars (Sketch Show)

Ekot (Sketch Show)

Trapéziste (Kahimi Karie)

I hate hate

2002

閃光 (Flash of Light by UA)

2001

Tone Twilight Zone

Drop (Do It Again)

Short Films

2004

Eyes (Getty Images, music by Cornelius)

Untitled (commissioned by Panasonic for the 2004 Olympics)

Filmography: Other work for TV

2004

カチカチ アサラト パンチ (Space Shower TV Station)

琴篇 (Space Shower TV Station)

ギター篇 (Space Shower TV Station)

控室篇 (Nippon Television)

Red (Nippon Television)

Kimagure Robot [DVD+CD]

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008