Outdoors

Yuichi Yokoyama is critically acclaimed for his kinetic gekiga comics, and his work has been exhibited across Europe, Asia and North America. Now, he further pushes the boundaries of what the comics medium can do with Outdoors – a clamorous fixation with the passage of time.

“My dialogue doesn't have humanism, but it has the spiritual. However, on the other hand, you can see they are without the spiritual. It is up to each reader's interpretation. ... I would like each reader to construe my works freely.” – Yuichi Yokoyama

Yuichi Yokoyama’s avant-garde gekiga (‘dramatic pictures’) comics are described unanimously as loud. The acclaimed artist has a clear fixation with sound and time – and an unbelievable eye for bringing such abstract concepts to life in panel form. Choosing to focus less on story and character building, Yokoyama uncannily shows the passing of time, suggesting that we should simply see things without labelling them. His work would feel Zen if it weren’t so acute. If he were a musician, he would be John Cage.

In Outdoors, our senses are assaulted as we follow a human riding a missile through a busy landscape – complete with sound effects – and experience this mad world from within the ears and eyes of the speechless people dotted throughout. Wordless, but anything but quiet, Outdoor is a relentless sound poem from a master craftsman.

• Yokoyama’s gekiga comics are unlike any other work being published today and completely push the edges of what the cartooning medium can do.
• With over 10 books translated into French and English and widespread critical acclaim, Yokoyama finally begins to receive the international attention his work deserves.
• The artist has work held in permanent collections across Japan and has exhibited in major galleries in Ireland, France, Italy, Belgium, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Canada, the USA, China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, The Philippines and South Korea.