Artists Taka Perry & Kentaro Yoshida On Life, Japan & Creating Art

This article originally appeared on VICE Australia.

Japan is one of the few countries on the planet that was never colonised by a Western power. This, combined with it being an island nation and its reluctance to open up to the rest of the world until very recently, has created a unique homogeneous culture – the perfect conditions for a country to really solidify its own cultural and artistic identity.

This is why classic Japanese art is so distinct, so encompassing of its culture. Today, the Japanese aesthetic is coveted across the planet. There’s just something special about Japanese art, and in turn, the artists who create it.

Art never stops. Not war, not famine; natural disaster, nor plague can squash the human need to create. But where does this drive come from?

We sat down with Japanese artist Kentaro Yoshida and Australian-Japanese artist Taka Perry to discuss life, art, and how they fuel their creativity while the world around them teeters on an unstable foundation.

Taka Perry

Taka Perry

Taka Perry is a multi-platinum Australian-Japanese artist who has worked with the likes of Ruel, Max Frost, Denzel Curry, Wifisfuneral, GoldLink, Sycco, Elle Teresa, Thomston, and A.GIRL. His creative contributions have amassed over 150 million plays on Spotify, with his single “Kuruna” featuring Japanese rapper JP The Wavy landed him on the cover of Spotify Japan’s New Era: J-Hip Hop playlist.

PTV: Hey Taka, your father is American and your mother is Japanese, but you grew up in Canberra and spent a lot of time in Japan too, right? That’s a pretty interesting upbringing — how has that affected you and your art?

Taka: Growing up, I spent two months of every year living with my grandparents in Sendai, Japan. As a result, my childhood was surrounded by both Australian and Japanese culture, language, art, and society. Now, I feel that I have two cultural lenses to view everything from, and it’s so prevalent in my identity that it’s hard to pinpoint exactly how it has affected me. I’m always trying to approach my life and art from both perspectives to find that middle ground unique to me, where I feel like I’m my most authentic self.

What do you miss most about Japan when you’re in Australia for long stretches? I used to live in Osaka and Tokyo and can’t wait to go back and annihilate some konbini fried chicken and canned iced coffee.

My favourite thing to do in Tokyo is to head to an Izakaya with my mates and catch up on life over bar snacks and beers. Most times the night will finish at some sweaty karaoke booth, singing cheesy Japanese classics. There are vending machines everywhere in Japan, so luckily when I wake up the next morning a bit hungover it’s pretty easy to locate a Suntory BOSS Coffee within minutes.

How do you like your coffee?

Black and no sugar all the way!

Taka Perry

I know this is a bit of a broad question, but what motivates you to create?

That feeling of being in a flow state is the best part of being a creative – when it’s just you and your art, everything else becomes irrelevant and time passes right by. When I’m creating, I’m just chasing that spark or idea that brings me back into that flow state, because that’s where everything falls into place and I’m at peace.

How has the pandemic affected you and your art?

Where to start? Japan is a huge part of my artistry and career, so since the pandemic, my collaborative process with Japanese artists has entirely been online. While I’ll definitely be back there at the first opportunity I can, I’m not one to sit on my hands and wait for things to get better, so the transition from in-person collaboration to online has been one that I’ve embraced and adapted to, so that once we finally return to a sense of normalcy I’m able to pick up right where I left off.

It’s pretty cool to be able to integrate your passion into what you do for a living, what do you love most about what you do?

The ability to have a seed of an idea in my head, and then being able to nurture that into something bigger than myself that other people can appreciate and craft their own meaning to. Meeting fans and hearing their stories of how my music has affected them, or seeing other people’s art inspired by what I’ve created is – to me – one of the best parts of being an artist.

What are you looking forward to most once things start to get back to some sense of normal?

I’m looking forward to travelling and seeing as much of the world as I can. Living through the pandemic for most of my early 20s has taught me that there are so many places to see and cultures to experience. I hope to take my artistry with me around the world and connect with creatives from all walks of life. And more music.

Kentaro Yoshida

Kentaro Yoshida

Kentaro Yoshida is an illustrator and artist. Born and raised in a rural fishing village in Toyama, Japan, he decided to move to Australia at the age of 18 in pursuit of the English language, sunny beaches and a more balanced lifestyle. Kentaro’s pastel-toned artwork exhibits bold line-work, quirky characters, and a beach-side sense of humour. He also specialises in hand-painting artwork from large-scale murals, to detailed painting on fragile watercolour paper.

PTV: Hey Kentaro, you moved to Australia from Japan when you were 18-years-old – that’s a huge move, what made you decide to make such a massive leap?

Kentaro: It was suggested by my mum – she asked me to go for language study in Australia for 10 months. She is a glass artist in Japan and had quite few opportunities to work with artists from overseas, therefore she wanted me to be able to speak English better than her. I had no idea what I wanted to do after high school, so I took her suggestion – it was a completely instant decision. But I never thought I’d live here for good when I first came here.

What was it like to grow up in Toyama?

I felt like it was boring when I was teenager. Like any other teenager, I dreamed of living in cities like Tokyo or Osaka… But a few years after I left Toyama, I started seeing it differently. We have a beautiful ocean and mountains so close to each other. The kind of place where you can go surfing in the morning and snowboarding in the afternoon. There are not many areas like that in the world. Now I respect where my roots come from and it’s my favourite town in Japan now.

What do you miss most about Japan?

I used to miss friends, the food, and shopping over there a lot. But now I miss my family the most. Especially after COVID hit, I haven’t been able to see them face-to-face, so I really hope to see them in 2022.

Your illustrations are absolutely breathtaking — how has your dual life in Australia and Japan impacted and inspired your art?

Thanks for the kind words. I used to draw a lot of Japanese comic characters when I was a kid. I also like to illustrate stuff I have observed or experienced, as well as the environment surrounding me – so life in Australia definitely has given me a lot of ideas.

How has the pandemic affected you and what have you done to make it through?

Work-wise it was really scary when it hit us in early 2020, but thankfully I have had quite a few good projects since then. I did work more digitally as I took more remote projects. Also, COVID made me rethink how important my little family in Australia is. During lockdown, my life routine was as simple as ever. I surfed in the morning, worked in a home studio, ate meals with my daughters and had a couple of beers with my wife. It was great seeing how fast the girls are growing so it definitely helped me going through a tough time last year.

Kentaro Yoshida

One of the many things I love about Japan is the fact there’s a vending machine on basically every corner, and they’re all filled with amazing assortments of canned coffee – do you remember the first time you had a canned coffee?

It was probably when I was so little so I don’t remember. But it was part of our culture and it’s so normal to us. On the way back home from school, we would always hang around the vending machine with friends and talk about stupid stuff – it was a great memory.

What’s your favourite variety of canned coffee?

Toyama is a snowy town and it’s pretty cold in winter. So I remember the moment having hot canned coffee in front of vending machines surrounded by snow and cold air. I actually miss that moment.

What do you think is the biggest difference between Japanese coffee culture and Australian coffee culture?

I never saw a barista before I came to Australia. Maybe it’s because I was from the countryside, but the whole “cafe culture” that exists here didn’t exist in Toyama when I left there in 2004.

From tradies to office workers, everyone had canned coffee back then. So that was a huge difference to me. I really enjoy cafe culture in Australia, but I missed Japan so much especially after COVID happened so it is great to be able to enjoy classic Japanese beverages like Suntory BOSS Coffee here too.

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