Project Summary

For this program, we dispatched a team of specialists in the highly in-demand field of pop culture (focused on animation and films) to rapidly growing ASEAN countries. The purpose was to utilize Japan’s strengths and conduct practical on-site workshops with the aim of assisting in developing human resources, enticing potential fans of Japanese culture, enhancing the presence of the culture, strengthening cultural transmission and promoting international cultural exchange.

Although society’s dependence on technology has been increasing rapidly in recent years, culture still plays a role as the soil that can nurture people’s rich spirit, and that soil needs be cultivated by humans. The casual exchange of cultural “information” has become possible through the internet; however, shared experiences between people in a real life setting, spending meaningful time together and having communication on deeper scales are irreplaceable events. In carrying out this program, we aimed to provide these deep level cultural experiences that can become a cornerstone in the lives of local young people.

We specifically planned and called our program, “Understanding culture through shared experiences of creation”. Japanese pop culture has been widely accepted in ASEAN countries. However, not many people actually know about how such pop culture was created, and from what kind of people it was created by. They might be able to look up such information, but they might not have actually experienced it. In the “shared experiences of creation”, members were meant to build relationships with each other based on respecting each other, listening to each other’s aspirations, giving them advice on how to accomplish such aspirations, or learning things from each other. When they realize that they have produced or gained something with the help of others that they couldn’t do on their own, then they have learned something and had a “shared experience”, regardless of the outcome of those experiences.

Setting these ideas as our background, we planned and implemented a cultural exchange program in animation and film fields in three ASEAN countries, with a focus on developing real shared experiences of creation. More specifically, we dispatched one of the best creators in Japan, who has high skills and a lot of experience in both fields, to the three countries which were Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand, to host practical workshops and give highly specialized lectures. Through these activities, we aimed to contribute to the development of human resources in these fields. We also hoped that the local young people would get acquainted with the creator’ skills, which represent Japanese visual culture and philosophy.

Furthermore, we set up a meeting for exchanging opinions with the dispatched lecturers, and the officials at local educational institutions and personnel related to the animation and film industry. They discussed the importance of developing skills in human resources internationally in the animation and film fields.

In the wake of this program, we hope that international co-productions between Japan and other ASEAN countries, and cooperation among their educational institutions, will continue to grow and foster excellent human resources in all of Asia.

In recent years, the film industry has been actively promoted by the government in Malaysia. So we focused on the theme of film, which is expected to flourish more and more as time goes on, and we carried out a camera and lighting workshop, with “Pinewood Iskandar Malaysia Studios” as our base, which got its start in 2014 in the Johor district adjacent to Singapore.

In Singapore, which celebrated the 50th anniversary of its founding in 2015, the world’s leading VFX production companies, including Lucasfilm and Double Negative, have set up branches in the past ten years. The advanced digital video field is expected to be more and more active, with films and animation merging together. So, we decided to combine both fields, film and animation, and we planned to give highly specialized master class lectures. 

Finally, in Thailand, the animation and film industry is not as active, but historically they have had a deep relationship with Japan in the animation field. Kantana Animation Studio, which produced Thailand’s first feature-length animation in 2006, started its production business as a subcontractor of Toei Animation Co., Ltd. Considering such a background, in order to contribute to the further development of animation in Thailand, we tried carrying out a similar practical workshop overseas for the first time, titled “Animation Boot Camp” that Takeuchi and Fuyama, directors of this program, have conducted since 2012 in Japan and which involves leading animators as lecturers.

We would like to note that this program was carried out in cooperation with UNIJAPAN and Tokyo University of the Arts. UNIJAPAN was responsible for placing orders, using its bureau and infrastructure, (business related to international promotion of Japanese films and animation, planning and production, administrative operation know-how, and appropriate and fast handling of paperwork, etc.). Tokyo University of the Arts was responsible for planning and management in order to complete the above-mentioned business.