Interviews
Inspirations
Well, of course, it starts off with the idea. Everyone is asked, where do you get your ideas. That’s the thing; it comes from everywhere. The entire idea for Usagi [Yojinbo] was from a sketch that I did in a sketch book. I had wanted to do a comic book based upon the Miyamoto Musashi, a real samurai who lived during the early 17th century. One day while just drawing in my sketchbook I just drew a rabbit with his ears tied up into a chongmage. I loved the design; it was unique. It looked really good. It was completely different from the Usagi of today, but that was the spark of what I’ve been doing for the past 26 years.
Date: September 28, 2010
Location: California, US
Interviewer: Lynn Yamasaki, Maria Kwong
Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum
