14 Jun 2023
Posted by Kelly Fleck 
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Neon Otaku, a mural by artist Tim Fukakusa currently at the TIFF Bell Lightbox as part of a new free public art exhibition, Reimagining: Narratives of tension and wonder until July 4. Photo courtesy: Tim Fukakusa.
TORONTO — Neon Otaku, a massive new mural adorning the atrium of the Toronto International Film Festival’s Bell Lightbox, pays homage to the Japanese cinema and pop culture that artist Tim Fukakusa loved while growing up and still loves today.
The skyline of a futuristic Toyko at night bursting with neon lights and the silhouette and face of two women evoke allusions to classic anime films, while a suited mobster looks like he just walked out of a Japanese film noir. These dark images contrast with bursts of soft pink sakura blossoms and long fluffy ears sprouting from the mobster’s head, a nod to the beloved character, Totoro, and joyful Studio Ghibli films.
“With a lot of Japanese movies and anime, there’s a lot of mixed feelings. It’s not like a Pixar movie, where you come out of it feeling super happy, and everything is tied together in a perfect bow,” Fukakusa tells Nikkei Voice in an interview. “So with the mural, I wanted to have different tones, dark and fun and light and airy, but also sad. It’s a big theme in my art, too.”
The push and pull of dark and light also mirror the themes and tone of TIFF’s new series Pop Japan, which celebrates the wide thematic variety of pop and cult Japanese film and art. The series features an impressive lineup, including six films from iconoclastic director Seijun Suzuki, nine poignant classic anime films, and a four-film ode to Studio Ghibli co-founder Hayao Miyazaki. Pop Japan runs at the TIFF Bell Lightbox from May 10 to June 27.
Japanese Canadian multidisciplinary artists Mitsuo Kimura (left) and graffiti artist and graphic designer Tim Fukakusa (right). Photo courtesy: Tim Fukakusa.
Pop Japan is paired with a new free public art exhibition, Reimagining: Narratives of tension and wonder, which features the works of Japanese Canadian multidisciplinary artists Mitsuo Kimura and Toko Hosoya, alongside Fukakusa’s original mural which runs until July 4.
Fukakusa (a.k.a. Ekwal) is a Toronto-based Japanese Canadian graffiti artist and graphic designer who has been honing his skills for the last 20 years. If you’re in Toronto, you may have seen some of his work. He was one of the artists behind the two Japantown murals on Sanko Trading Co. on Queen Street West and the second floor of the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre and has painted various public art pieces around the city.
Influenced by anime, comic illustration, and Asian culture, Fukakusa’s work is a way to connect to his Japanese heritage. These influences can be seen particularly in the linework in Fukakusa’s art. In manga and anime, each line conveys movement, meaning, and emotion, says Fukakusa. Similarly, this linework appears in traditional Japanese art forms like calligraphy and ukiyo-e, woodblock prints.
At first, Fukakusa was hesitant to take on the TIFF mural project. Since he would be painting the mural inside the lobby of a building, he would have to work with low-odour paint. While Fukakusa occasionally paints smaller pieces with paintbrushes and paint markers, 99 per cent of the time, he works with spray paint.
So Fukakusa had to adapt. Working instead with bucket paint, he created a design using a limited colour palette to evoke a graphic, posterized style that resembles the pages of a graphic novel or manga. It took Fukakusa four days to paint the mural, and he channeled his graffiti background to paint the giant piece quickly and efficiently.
Artist Tim Fukakusa adds the finishing touches to his mural, Neon Otaku, during the opening night reception of Reimagining: Narratives of tension and wonder at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. Photo courtesy: Tim Fukakusa.
“Once they told me the film series, and I saw the whole theme of the project, I said, ‘Okay, this is exactly the kind of thing I’ve been waiting for’,” says Fukakusa. “I just love anime, manga, and especially the Japanese B-movies and older Japanese movies, so just being able to celebrate that and show it to everybody, I knew I wanted to be a part of this project for that.”
The mural is also an homage to the Japanese films he used to watch with his grandmother. His aunts, uncles, and father don’t speak Japanese, likely a result of his grandparents’ internment experience, says Fukakusa.
“For me and my family, and I’m sure a lot of other families and other Japanese Canadians, it took away a lot of culture,” says Fukakusa. “Growing up, I didn’t talk about my New Year’s celebrations with my friends, you feel kind of embarrassed about it, almost like there’s this weird carry-over shame from 60 years ago, and I didn’t really get it until I got older.”
Only his grandmother could speak Japanese, and they would watch Japanese films together. For his grandmother, it was a way to practice her Japanese, and for Fukakusa, these were films he loved. It became a way for Fukakusa to connect to his Japanese culture and spend time with his grandmother. When Fukakusa was a teenager, one of the only places to buy Japanese films and manga was Chinatown.
“It can be a little awkward because it’s just the box art, there’s no description, and back then, you couldn’t Google what the movie was about. So I would just buy it from the picture, and sometimes it would be a really weird movie or something really dark. But just watching them together was nice,” says Fukakusa.
The digital design of the mural, Neon Otaku, that Tim Fukakusa created for TIFF’s Pop Japan series. Photo credit: Tim Fukakusa.
Pop Japan is a celebration of how Japanese pop culture has entered the North American mainstream, and Fukakusa is excited to be a part of it. As a teenager, anime and manga were not popular like it is today. Now there are weekend-long conventions dedicated to anime, festivals celebrating Japanese cinema like the Toronto Japanese Film Festival and TIFF, and shelves of manga available at most bookstores.
“Even when it comes to anime, when I was younger, it was not popular. I was kind of a weirdo for liking it,” says Fukakusa. “Most people were not really into it, and it was kind of an extra level of being a nerd. Now, it’s so popular and celebrated, and everyone’s favourite movie is Spirited Away, so just being able to share that with people is really important to me.”
During the exhibit’s opening reception on May 10, Fukakusa finished the mural during a live-painting session, where guests could watch him paint and ask questions about his work and inspirations. The evening was dedicated to celebrating Japanese Canadian artists and Japanese cinema and pop culture and was a moment to be proud of his Japanese culture. Especially because his six-year-old daughter, who is named after his grandmother, was there.
“Originally, my daughter and my wife weren’t going to be able to come to the opening, then at the last minute, they were able to come, so that was a pretty big deal… just sharing that with her,” says Fukakusa. “I want her to grow up being excited about and proud of [her culture], and show her friends, and not grow up the same way I did, where I was very conflicted about it.”
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To learn more about Tim Fukakusa, visit www.instagram.com/timmifuk/
To learn more about TIFF’s Pop Japan series, visit www.tiff.net/pop-japan.
