I had the opportunity to visit “The Doraemon Tokyo 2017 Art Exhibit” at Roppongi Hills which was held on November 1, 2017 through January 8, 2018 at the Mori Arts Center Gallery (52F) at Mori Tower.
For those who are not familiar with “Doraemon”, back in 1969 when Fujiko F. Fujio created the popular manga (comic book) series “Doraemon”.
One of the best-selling manga in the world, “Doraemon” has sold over 100 million copies as of 2015.
Fujiko F. Fujio is actually a duo comprised of two Japanese manga artists: Hiroshi Fujimoto and Motoo Abiko, who became partners in 1951 and adopted the name Fujiko Fujio in 1954. The two ended their partnership in 1987, so there are individual works released under two different names, Fujiko Fujio A (for Abiko) and Fujiko F. Fujio (for Fujimoto).
While “Doraemon” may not have had the promotion as it does in Japan in another countries, those into Japanese pop culture know how popular the character is, as Doraemon is a popular character in Japanese pop culture, as Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny is to American culture.
“Doraemon” has had success in comics, animation, films, video games and is no doubt a merchandise powerhouse that people of all generations still continue to purchase to this day, despite Fujiko F. Fujio’s passing in 1996.
The manga revolves around a pre-teen boy named Nobita Nobi. Nobita is not good with anything…sports, socializing, if anything, he’s quite lazy and naive.
But one day, Nobita is shocked when a robotic cat from the future named Doraemon and a male teen from the 22nd century come to visit him. Doraemon explains that teen is Sewashi, the great-great-grandson of Nobita.
Of course, Nobita doesn’t believe it at first, but Sewashi explains to him that he is unlucky and would make things rough for his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren due to his unlucky nature. And so, he is leaving the robotic cat Doraemon to stay with him and help him.
Sewashi does give Nobita a hint of his future, that he would marry his childhood bully’s sister, Jaiko which shocks Nobita, consider he dislikes both Gian and Jaiko.
And so, Doraemon lives with Nobita in hopes to make his life better.
But due to Nobita’s laziness, each time Doraemon comes up with a gadget to help him, Nobita finds a way to misuse it and cause problems for himself and Doraemon.
Can Doraemon ever help Nobita to be a better person?
I’ve been a fan of “Doraemon” for many years and surprisingly, back when I got into Japanese pop culture, “Doraemon” is among one of the big name characters that there was sparse information of.
I am not surprised, considering Doraemon is considered a children’s character, along the likes of Anpan Man and I suppose one can equate it to Americans who grew up watching or reading Mickey Mouse books or animated films or probably even more fitting are the “Peanuts” characters, as we watch Charlie Brown often being helped by his friends or Snoopy.
But Nobita is more of the naive, clumsy and lazy type. Each time you hope he grows up or matures, he often does something idiotic and misuses any positive device that Doraemon brings to him.
“The Doraemon Tokyo 2017 Art Exhibit” featured at Roppongi Hills features 28 artists who are active in Japan and overseas.
But the theme of this exhibit was what kind of world would Doraemon be in if these artists expressed “Your Doraemon”?
The last art exhibit for Doraemon was “The Doraemon Exhibition” back in 2002.
Yuji Yamashita, an art historian and a professor at Meiji Gakuin University said, “It is 15 years since “THE Doraemon exhibition” in 2002. The sequel to be held in full is “THE Doraemon exhibition TOKYO 2017″ this time. If I think, during this time the contemporary art scene of Japan has expanded its base. It is pleasant that the person who continues further active afterwards in the last exhibition artist will again exhibit the new work. Furthermore, I selected writers who have achieved remarkable growth during the past 15 years and asked for production. They are exactly Doraemon generation. Many audiences must be made aware of the collaboration between national characters and state-of-the-art contemporary art”.
In the next blog posts, I will showcase “The Doraemon Tokyo 2017 Art Exhibit at Roppongi Hills” that I attended back in December but for now, enjoy the promotions for the art exhibit outside the venue.
