Kozyndan

Portraits From the (Off) Center of The Universe

pencil, digital
2003

What we said about it at the time: There is a battle going in in the Seattle suburb called Fremont. long a bastion of individuality and "hippie" ethics, like so many places it is being taken over by the corporate machine. The statues that guard the neighborhood seem a bit perturbed by it all and the salmon have decided to tthrown in their 2 cents as well (or maybe they have all decided they want to become tasty sashimi for us to fill our bellies with). i don't know - this one is just all over the place - if you are from Fremont you probably get this piece (and you should buy this piece as well, heh heh).

Looking back: We made this panoramic in part to be the centerpiece in a kaiten sushi bar that was opening at the intersection depicted here. The owners flew us out to Seattle, put us up, and showed us all around the town, giving us history of the area, in particular Fremont. We took all this back home, along with photos of the owners of the sushi bar and their chef, and started throwing all the ideas we had into the piece. I don't think we left anything out, for better or for worse. its a bit too "touristy" in a sense. I think whenever we do a project that is at all meant to benefit some company, we tend to box ourselves in and limit our thinking to something that would be considered pleasing to the lowest common denominator. I don't think we really need to do this, but even today we have trouble really putting in the more twisted things we might think of if we are working for a client (although technically speaking we weren't really working for a client here). Personally though i really like how the "storylines" of the school girls and the robots collide in this piece - i always kind of imagine the girls marrying these robots and going off on adventures together, wherever our panoramics take them.

The Yum-cha Militia

or "(My Mother thought she had SARS, but it turned out to be PMS)"
pencil, digital
2003

What we said about it at the time: This panoramic depicts the imaginary history of the Yum Cha militia's (An old chinese ladies' auxilliary group that most spends it time playing mah jong and gossiping, but which rises to the occasion when called upon) defense of San Francisco's Chinatown from gleeful marauding SARS viruses. Armed only with dim-sum the brave women pushed back the invaders to keep San Fran free of the disease. This went almost entirely unknown to most of the public, but this was of little concern to the militia - they just wanted to get back to gossiping...

Looking back: Still one of our favorite panoramics to this day. We love everything about it - the color, the humorous, topical main narrative, the way re-occurring characters (the school girls) observe the main narrative, the overall flow of the piece. Also the butcher chasing the escaping roasted ducks is still funny to me every time i see it. It should be noted that the main reason we chose to do this panoramic is so that we could depict the fashion sense of old Chinese ladies in the US, which is totally off the wall. These ladies have some kind of style!

Kin-san's Business Trip

pencil, digital
2004

What we said about it at the time: The Japanese Salaryman's life is pretty regimented and requires him to endure quite a bit of abuse from above (and he must smile all the time). while his late nights are finished off with macho drunken carousing with fellow salarymen. But maybe this isn't the life these men really seek - every day on the subway they see hordes of young school girls who are giggling and gossiping, taking pictures, shopping endlessly...ahh - the life, the life! To be a school girl!

Looking back: A very fun piece for us. The schoolman made his first of many appearances in this panoramic. The concept of the schoolmen, as i envisioned them, is sort of a jumble of comments all rolled into one goofy character. The monotonous life of the salaryman, the peculiar sexual culture of japan in which anything goes in fantasy life, but actual sex lives are rather unfulfilling on average, men (both Japanese and gaijin) being obsessed with the school girl all collided in my head and these guys popped out. I kind of imagine them having some kind of impromptu meet up in random places, where they can all escape they stress of their boring jobs and relate to each other on a more naive level.

The Kin-san referred to in the title is kozy's own father. He is the one holding the big pink stuffed bear. He goes away on business trips a lot for the company he owns, but we thought it funny to think of him as having this secret life. Maybe one day when we are in Tokyo we will stumble across a flash mob of schoolmen in a Tokyo train station and find kozy's dad in a skirt, eating a big crepe and giggling with the guys...

I really would like to make toys of these guys. Do you think many people would want to buy a detailed, 12 inch tall doll, with cloth school girl outfit and all the requisite miniature accessories?