Koji Yamamura

Anime in Metamorphosis

Koji Yamamura's delightful animations invite us into a distinctive world that contains echoes of Paul Klee and Monty Python, but is wholy original and accessible. In Yamamura's world, trees grow out of heads, birds dream of fruit, and children are swallowed by whales (but return safely to a prosaic bus stop). Much of his work seems to have been created for sheer visual pleasure, but some suggests a slightly educational bent: English and Japanese words and images float together to create a "pictionary," and children in Japan and America collaborate with the artist to produce a humorous animated film about choices.

Studio drawings cover a table during production of animation based on Basho Matsuo's renku (linked poem), "A Winter Day."

Storyboard drawings for "A Rainy Day" from Karo & Piyobupt, a short film series for children, directed and animated by Yamamura for NHK. Widely popular with children and adults alike, it used clay and other media.

A drawing for Karo & Piyobupt.

Although they vary greatly in length and content, Yamamura's animations contain recurring themes and leitmotifs. Perhaps the most important of these is a fascination with metamorphosis. In this regard, he claims descent from an honorable lineage: Since the very first animated film, Winsor McCay's 1914 Little Nemo in Slumberland, animators have reveled in their ability to transform the visual world. Yamamura exercises this fundamental capability to an extraordinary degree, creating worlds in constant flux, characterized by dazzling visual images that shift and change in the blink of an eye.

In Suisei (Aquatic), for example, a man watches as his reflection in the river becomes that of a fish, which in turn becomes an eye, which then transforms into a seahorse, which next becomes a whole army of slightly predatory-looking fish. In Japanise English Pictionary, Yamamura takes English words with their Japanese translations and links them in a dizzying, interlocking sequence to a series of images that morph across the screen. The viewer receives a lesson in the mutability of meanings, and may even learn some English or Japanese.

Mt. Head, drawn, animated, directed, and edited by Yamamura, is a 10-minute short based on the rakugo traditional comic story by the same name. He interpreted the original tale in his own way and changed it to a modern setting. In the story, a bold man with bushy eyebrows picks up a cherry and eats the pit so as not to waste anything. A tree grows from the top of his head and cherry blossom viewers swarm to see him. It was nominated for the 75th Academy Awards Short Films' Animation Category in 2003 and received the Jury's Special Award at Holland Animation Film Festival, along with many other international awards.

On the whole, however, Yamamura's whimsical surrealism seems largely aimed at providing pure aesthetic pleasure. Unlike Tabaimo, whose works critique Japanese society, or Makoto Shinkai, whose Voices of a Distant Star tapped themes of technological alienation, Yamamura seems content to play or, at most, satirize, as in his brilliant Atama Yama (Mt. Head), in which a cherry tree (iconic symbol of Japanese culture) grows from the head of an increasingly bemused and finally angry middle-aged man. This work might very well be seen as commentary on contemporary Japan and its ambivalent attitude toward tradition, but it is also a visual joy.

Or perhaps Yamamura's emphasis on metamorphosis is itself a reflection of Japanese society, one in which change and transformation are as much a part of life as are the cherry trees.

Koji Yamamura Animation Creator, Illustrator Born in 1964, Koji Yamamura started creating animated films while in college. He conceived a unique visual world by combining several media, including modeling clay, three-dimensional figures, photography, and line drawings. He founded Yamamura Animation in 1993, and serves on the board of directors of both the the Japan Animation Association and the Japan Chapter of the International Animated Film Association. In 2003, Mt. Head was nominated for the 75th Academy Awards Short Films' Animation Category. His free-spirited creativity and detailed drawing ability have received wide recognition and praise, leading to numerous invitational screenings and awards at international competitions and film festivals. http://www.jade.dti.ne.jp/~yam