My art and Japanese culture

Here you may see a part of my comics, made about my life in my own world that also intersects with the real one. I have come up with that the idea when I was 15, so I have decided to create an ideal world with no politics, no sex, and no violence, and place in it characters who represent me and my friends. I have decided to tell a story of my life, and then, when I started to face problems, I have understood it will be hard to make an interesting story in the utopia, so some problems were introduced into the story by adding travel into the real world.

The visual style and some ideas of the plot were mainly inspired by an anime and manga I was really into. The best example is “No Game No Life” anime. It is about brother and sister who got sick of their life and were playing video games all the time. But ones, the goddess decided to move them into the game world – the ideal one for them.

Colours in the anime were really saturated and diverse. I was so much in love with those, so I have bought the NGNL art book and tried to copy the style. It is not seen much on this concrete comic strip because of the tool I were using, but generally, my colours are bright and varied. Also, the face style was inspired by anime as well – huge eyes, no nose and also some of the emotions, such as a way to represent a little flush on the face by few pink dashes. Another detail is “tadaima” word in the beginning – the thing Japanese people say when they enter the house.

Some manga influence might be seen in the sound representation and drawing style as well. The interesting fact is the paper version of the comic was made from right to the left, same as it is in the manga.

Japanese culture also took place in one of the “countries” in the world I have made. There is one for the technological elves, where the skyscrapers and modern technologies stay together with traditional wooden houses. The comic also has some other references to Japan.

By creating this comic I’ve wanted to illustrate or the critique a lot of absolutely different stuff I have seen in my life. For example, the absence of sex firstly was made because of my disgust of the horrible thing people do because of their lust. Then it also became a way to show the world without gender stereotypes. Plus, it also went into a concept there are no parents who have made their children, so technically all of them are adopted. It was my way to show how much I do not like people, who emphasize the difference between their own children and others.

I still have lots of stuff to say to the world, and I am still in the process of creation. I want this comic to be not only relevant and educative at some part, but also I want it to be an interesting story with an elaborate world and deep characters.