Koji Yamamura Retrospective at Nippon Connection 2014

Nippon Connection 2014 will be holding a retrospective of the career of acclaimed independent animator Kōji Yamamura on May 30,2014.  Yamamura himself will be in attendance and I am honoured to announce that I will be hosting a Q+A with him after the screenings.

Yamamura has received numerous awards in his career including Grand Prix at several prestigious festivals (Annecy 2003, Zagreb 2004, Hiroshima 2004, et al.) and an Oscar nomination (2003).  His films bring together cultural influences from not only his native country but also from abroad, particularly Canada (Norman McLaren, Ishu Patel, et al.)  and Europe (Yuri Norstein, Priit Pärn, et al.).  His work also demonstrates the influence of literature, with some of his films being inspired by such varied works as Franz Kafka’s A Country Doctor, Jorge Luis Borges’s “The Library of Babel” (Fictions), the Kojiki (the oldest extant text of Japanese mythology), and traditional rakugo storytelling (Atama Yama). 

The retrospective is a cross-section of his works since 1998. This includes some of his most critically acclaimed films like Mt. Head and Muybridge’s Strings, as well as some of his lesser known works such as Jubilee, the music video he made for a song by Kazuyoshi Nakamura, and Anthology with Cranes, his adaptation of an original painting by 17^th century artist Sōtatsu Tawaraya.  See the full listing of films below.

Yamamura is professor of animation at Tokyo University of the Arts (aka Geidai), and will also be presenting a selection of films by recent graduates of the programme at NipponConnection 2014.  He is currently vice-president of the Japanese Animation Association and a member of the board of the Japanese branch of ASIFA.  Yamamura recently opened an animation store and gallery called Au Praxinoscope in Jiyugaoka.  The gallery is currently holding an exhibition on Pritt Pärn which runs until May 31^st and will be followed by an Igor Kovalyov solo exhibition. 

Koji Yamamura Retrospective

Date:  Friday, May 30
Time:  17:30
Location:  Naxoshalle Kino
Tickets:  Nippon Connection

Filmmachergespräch mit Koji Yamamura 
Moderation: Cathy Munroe Hotes

Date:  Friday, May 30
Time:  22:15
Location:  Mousonturm Studio 3

Eintritt Frei (Free Entry)

The retrospective will include: 

The Hyuga episode of Kojiki  (古事記 日向篇/ Kojiki Hyūgahen, Japan, NHK, 2013)

Four short episodes from the Kojiki including Japan's creation myth and the emergence of the gods.  I plan to review this one at some time between now and NC2014.  

Mr. Rib Globe (地球肋骨男/Chikyu Rokkotsu Otoko, Japan, 1998)

The oldest Yamamura film in the retrospective, this short short was made for TV.  A surreal little piece about a terrestrial globe with a skeletal structure inside.

Jubilee ( Japan, 1999)

A music video to promote the song by Kazuyoshi Nakamura.

Pieces (おまけ/Omake, 2003)

A playful series of nine vignettes that incorporates visual gags, 19th century animation technology and surrealist humour.  Read my full review here.

Fig (無花果/Ichijiku, Tokyo Loop omnibus, 2006)

Yamamura's contribution to the omnibus animation Tokyo Loop, which combines a celebration of the 100th anniversary of Stuart Blackton's Humorous Phases of Funny Faces (1906) with an ode to the city of Tokyo.  In Fig, Tokyo Tower and a window transform themselves into characters and roam the nightscape of Tokyo.   Learn more about Tokyo Loop here.

Anthology with Cranes (鶴下絵和歌巻/Tsuru shitae waka kan, Japan, 2011)

five fire fish (Canada, NFB, 2013)

An improvisation on the NFB's iPad app McLaren's Workshop. See my article Direct Animation for the Tablet Generation to learn more.

Mt. Head (頭山/Atama Yama, Japan, 2002)

The first Yamamura animation I ever saw, Mt. Head is an adaptation of a rakugo story in collaboration with rakugo performer and musician Takeharu Kunimoto.  Read more.

The Old Crocodile (年をとった鰐/Toshi wo Totta Wani, Japan, 2005)

An adaptation of French author and illustrator Leopold Chauvaud's "Histoire du vieux crocodile."  Learn more here.

A Child’s Metaphysics (こどもの形而上学/Kodomo no Keijijōgaku, 2007)

A delightful rumination on what it means to be a child.  Read more here.

Muybridge’s Strings (マイブリッジの糸/Maiburijjino Ito, Canada/Japan, NFB, 2011)

A poetic investigation of the nature of time that takes us on a journey into cinematic history.  Learn more in my review.

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2014

Rain Won’t (雨ニモマケズ, 2013)

 “Ame ni mo makezu” (Be not Defeated by the Rain) is one of the most famous poems in the Japanese language.  Written by beloved author Kenji Miyazawa, the poem was discovered among his possessions after his passing in 1933.  Like Max Ehrmann’s “Deriderata” (1927), “Ame ni mo makezu” is a kind of a mantra or a musing on how to live one’s best life.

This bilingual picture book edition Rain Won’t (雨ニモマケズ/ Ame ni mo makezu, 2013), has been translated by American poet and translator, Arthur Binard and illustrated by renowned animator Kōji Yamamura.  In the afterward, Binard suggests that he wanted to recapture the lost traditional landscapes of Miyazawa’s Iwate Prefecture. “Kenji lived in a land where people grew, raised, and caught all their food.  Now more than 60 perfect of what’s eaten in Japan is imported,” Binard writes, and goes on to lament the loss of arable lands and free-flowing rivers to commercial urban streetscapes and concrete riverbanks.  Binard seems to be using Miyazawa’s words as a rallying cry against nuclear power and multinational corporations and in favour of a return to living in harmony with the environment.

our Miyazawa noren

This message resonates very strongly for my family because this poem has special meaning to us.  My husband specialises in sustainable agriculture and shortly after the disaster of 3/11 we were visited by friends/colleagues from Japan.  One of them, brought us a noren from Iwate and told us what a close call he had the day of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami (see intro to: Anime Adaptations of Kenji Miyazawa’s Stories and Poems to read full story).  Iwate is just north of Fukushima and was badly affected by the 2011 tsunami.  As part of the redevelopment of this area, some researchers are looking at how to restore Satoyama landscapes.

Order from amazon.co.jp.

With his lovingly drawn illustrations, Koji Yamamura has managed to capture the beauty and diversity off the Satoyama landscape of Miyazawa’s time (early Shōwa period).  Satoyama (里山) is the name of the landscape that is cushioned between the mountain foothills and arable land.  It “is characterized by a mosaic feature of different land uses such as woodland, grassland, paddy field, farmland, irrigation ponds and canals, and human settlements, which have been maintained in an integrated manner.” (source: satoyama-initiative.org).  Simply put, it is a landscape in which humans and the natural world are living in harmony with one another.  The most famous example in Japanese popular culture is the rural landscape that the Kusakabe family (Mei, Satsuki and their Dad) move to in Hayao Miyazaki’s My Neighbour Totoro (1988).

Using a limited palette (green, brown, yellow, a little bit of red), Yamamura not only depicts the landscape suggested by the original poem, but also adds depictions of the creatures that thrive in a Satoyama landscape.  This includes a variety of insects (dragonflies, grasshoppers, ladybugs, wasps, etc.), birds (tits, swallows, egrets, owls, etc.), and mammals (tanuki, domestic animals), and, of course, people.   

The result is a beautiful picture book edition of Rain Won’t (雨ニモマゲズ/ Ame ni mo makezu, 2013) that is fully bilingual and can be enjoyed by the whole family.  Although it looks like a typical children’s storybook, the language and philosophy is geared more to an adult reader.  The illustrations are very detailed – the kind of book you can read again and again and always spot something new.

Order from amazon.co.jp.

Catherine Munroe Hotes

My thanks to Koji Yamamura for his generosity.

Related Post:  Anime Adaptations of Kenji Miyazawa’s Stories and Poems

Tokyo University of the Arts at Nippon Connection 2014

Acclaimed independent animator Kōji Yamamura will be presenting a selection of works by recent graduates of the animation graduate programme of Tokyo University of the Arts (Geidai) at Nippon Connection 2014.  The students are supervised by Yamamura himself, animation producer Mitsuko Okamoto, who last year presented a selection of works at NC2013, and stop motion animator Yūichi Itō　(i-toon.org).  Other animators who teach at the school include Taruto Fuyama of Koma Koma Lab, who is currently developing stop motion animation software, and Royal College of Arts graduate Hiromitsu Murakami.

Here are the 9 films that will be screened at Nippon Connection 2014.  The film descriptions and student profiles were provided by Geidai’s Graduate School of Film and New Media.  I have added official websites/blogs/twitter handles if you'd like to learn more about these up-and-coming East Asian artists.  I just saw some of these films at Stuttgart 2014 and there are some real gems that I will write about in the near future.

Date: Thursday, May 29, 2014 
Time: 17:30
Venue: Naxoshalle Kino, Frankfurt am Main
For Tickets: Nippon Connection

Catherine Munroe Hotes

Everyday Sins (日々の罪悪/Hibi no Zaiaku, 2014)

Guilty is an art university student who is slacking off on her school work and feels horrible about it. Plus, she's confused about her family and Christianity, and she can't even get her ex-boyfriend to accept a small present she bought for him.

Yewon Kim キム・イェオン

Filmography: "Little Sweetheart" 2010, "LANGUAGE" 2011, "My Frame" 2013, "Everyday Sins" 2014

Biography:  Born in Republic of Korea, 1988. Graduated from Korea Animation High school, Department of Animation in 2006. Tokyo Polytechnic University, Department of Animation (2011). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation 2014).              

Flower Bud (花芽/ Haname, 2014)        

The uncertainty, struggles, and joy of the moment upon becoming an adult. Between lullabies and songs I hum to myself. Between a man and myself. That subtle flickering in a single instant, forgotten once it is over.  Never forget that moment. . .              

Saki Nakano 中野咲

Fimography: “Fragments of One” 2012, “Ream” 2013     

Biography: Born in Gunma, 1988.  Joshibi University of Design. Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).         

PAMON (パモン, 2014)

PAMON are magical and mysterious creatures who can move the hair on their head however they wish, and communicate using their chest hair. This tale takes a peek at an ordinary day for the PAMON.   

Kazushige Tōma 当真一茂

Filmography: "BANABANAFRIENDS of Work" 2010 "Scary of crack of Work" 2011, "Happy fluffy time of Work" 2013               

Biography: Born in Okinawa, 1988.  Okinawa Prefectural University of the Arts, Department of Design and Crafts Design (2012). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014). 

Mrs. KABAGOdZILLA (ミセス・カバゴジラ, 2014)  

“Mrs. KABAGodZILLA had a daughter whose feet and arms looked just like her own.” Mother and child were always together, but the mother's hospitalization makes the daughter remember the past, and think a little about what lies ahead. 

Moe Koyano 小谷野萌　　　https://www.youtube.com/user/MoyanoKOE

Filmography: "Kyu-ri" (2010), "No Sound, I'm Here." (2011), "OPENIT" (2012), "My Dear Flesh" (2013)     

Biography: Born in Tokyo, 1989.  Tokyo Polytechnic University, Department of Animation (2012). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).

  

             

Lonesome Hero (ひとりぼっちのヒーロー/Hitori botchi no hīrō, 2014)    

This is for children who couldn't be on their own. And, for the time when you're older and you've forgotten your determination to be on your own.          

Manami Wakai 若井麻奈美　　http://jitojito.ninja-web.net/top.html

Filmography: "TRAIANGLE", 2010 "Daily Lives at Daisy Lodge", 2013         

Biography: Born in Kanagawa, 1989.  Tama Art University, Department of Paintings, Oil paintings (2012). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).

00:08     (2014)  

This piece takes 8 seconds, and creates intervals between the frames, and then makes them bigger. It's about expansion and enlargement, not the passage of time. 8 seconds becomes that much more luxuriant.    

Yūtarō Kubo 久保雄太郎　　　https://twitter.com/yutaro960

Filmography: "crazy for it" 2012, "Kicking Rocks" 2013     

Biography: Born in Oita, 1990.  Polytechnic University, Department of Animation (2012). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).        

Crazy Little Thing (澱みの騒ぎ/Yodomi no Sakagi, 2014)

The two of them, all alone at home. All alone with her father's corpse. Memories, ideals, and reality all sink beneath the muck. Everyone is alone. Everyone is in solitude.     

Onohana  小野ハナ (Hana Ono) 　 http://ginkgo.raindrop.jp/

https://twitter.com/__Onohana

Filmography: "Do as the Fish Tells You" 2013       

Biography: Born in Iwate, 1986.  Iwate University, Department of education, Art and Culture (2009). Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).

Exit My Room (おでかけ/Odekake, 2014)

He lives his life everyday like it's nothing special. Today he eats, gets dressed, and heads out once again.             

Ayaho Kawakami 川上彩穂　　http://moment-moment.tumblr.com/

Filmography: "I'm nothing" (2013)           

Biography: Born in 1989.  Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Department of Ecoregion Science (2012). Graduated from the Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).           

My Milk Cup Cow (コップの中の子牛/Koppu no naka no Koushi, 2014)

Father tells his 4-year-old daughter Nunu that there's a cow at the bottom of her milk cup. Nunu believes him and drinks all of her milk, but there is no cow. Nunu gradually stops believing her father, who constantly tells her various lies.       

Yantong Zhu 朱彦潼 　　https://twitter.com/marumaru_ken

Filmography: "Loft" 2010, "The Man Who Ate an Apple" 2012     

Biography: Born in Nanjing China, 1988. After graduating from Nanjing University of Finance and Economics, Department of Adverting in 2010, Zhu came to Japan and started making animated shorts. Tokyo University of the Arts, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation (2014).

Adapted from official press notes provided to Nippon Connection 2014 by Geidai Graduate School of Film and New Media   

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2014