A rascal fox flings a dorky ghost around in a five-minute black and white brush animation called “Nanja Monja Ghost”.
The characters don’t speak but the simple black and white paint a picture of happy and sad with a vibrant touch. It’s Yokosuka’s debut piece that won her an award in an International Anime Festival.
Her philosophy is “not to draw,” but to “cherish what’s created in the parts you don’t draw.” It’s more important than to fill every empty space with details.
Yokosuka is from Hitachinaka City in Ibaraki Prefecture. She grew up reading manga by Ryoko Yamagishi and Omoto Hagi.
She attended a specialty school and felt attracted to ink animation, in which she could blur or smear lines. “I knew that was it” she says, and walked a straight path toward becoming a professional. She worked during the day and started drawing when she got home, often continuing late into the night.
One thousand five hundred paintings are needed to create an average five-minute ink animation. Her exhausted hand shuddered as she created a video every six months.
Eventually a production company asked her to work for them just as she completed “Nanja Monja Ghost”. It was the beginning of animation creator Reiko Yokosuka.
Trees, mermaids, and mischievous spirits are often the centerpiece of her stories. She participated in the production of “Kitaro and the Millennium Curse” in 2007.
Her upbringing surrounded by nature nurtured a love for things unseen. Her husband’s job brought her to Sapporo, where she enjoys watching the changing seasons.
She is now interested in an original story. Images from a short novel she’d like to draw circle her mind until they are satisfied by the touch of her brush
NHK Educational TV Puchi Puchi Anime
Nanja Monja Ghost
Mon – Fri 8:30am to 8:35am and 4:15pm to 4:20pm
© Reiko Yokosuka - NHK, NEP
