HF: What’s your strongest memory of your childhood? Can you remember the first time that you realized that you could draw?
KT: It is too long ago to remember when I first draw. The strongest memory in my boyhood was the war, namely that was the time when the US air force B-29 flew over Tokyo, to made the entire city in flames. I escaped into the air-raid shelter and was staring at such desperate view with bated breath, felt the heat almost burning my face, so I was always covering my face with a wet towel and enduring such fear as though it would be continued endlessly.
In my boyhood, I was always scolded by mother since I was drawing manga all day. I was not interested in the things other than watching movies and drawing pictures. The movies I watched were over 500 for a year, but most of those were a kind of B movies. My admiration for American culture was strengthened by the heroes in the western movies, glamorous beautiful blonde women, gorgeous diners, and the animations such as Mickey Mouse, Betty Boop, Popeye, which have greatly influenced me and even my current works.
HF: You have been credited as the pioneer of Pop Art in post-war Japan. Do you find that Pop Art in Japan differs from the rest of the world? How do you explain your affinity for working in this style of art?
KT: In my early stage, I was influenced by Pop art of US and UK, especially the methodology of Andy Warhol enabled to go across the boundaries between medias which fully overwhelmed me, thereby I dedicated myself to making experimental films and art books. A number of works of Pop art in US art magazines which I found in the imported book shop in Tokyo strongly stimulated my creativity. Compared with the sophisticated expression style of US’s or UK’s Pop art, Japanese Pop art seems more tied with local issues.
HF: As an artist who incorporates such a diversity of influences, are there specific artists or styles that you most identify with? Which mediums do you choose to work with these days?
KT: The art which I identify with is of Giorgio de Chirico and Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, among Japanese art is of the painters in Edo period such as Soga Shohaku, Itoh Jakuchu and Hasegawa Tohaku. Especially, Jakuchu’s works are so elaborate and profound, which always overwhelm me.
What most inspired me is B movies in US. For example, Roy Rogers in the over-decorated shining costume riding the white house Trigger was as though moving pop art; the scene of Jane Russell almost exposing her breast and laying on hay in a glamorous pose was imprinted on my mind and that would never be wiped off; the mystery and fantasy of Creature from the Black Lagoon; and the skyscraper resounded with the footsteps of Lauren Bacall walking in high heels; these are all the sources of my inspiration.
The materials I use are acrylic paint, canvas, conté, crayon and so on, thereby not special materials, but some time I use the glass broken into pieces to be put on the surface of the canvas to make an effect produced by reflection of light. The inspirations for my works come from manga, porn books, tabloid magazines full of trivial scandalous articles, the portraits of murders or photos of catastrophic crime scenes placed on newspaper, namely that are not high culture stuffs.
The inspirations for my works come from manga, porn books, tabloid magazines full of trivial scandalous articles, the portraits of murders or photos of catastrophic crime scenes placed on newspaper…
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