>Hugz<

Another Korean bara arist that I came across at X (former Twitter), Unspoken . As you can see, he's very skilled in drawing and using colors and such. He seems to upload his steamy comics in Patreon from time to time. When I first found his artwork at Twitter, I thought he and Huntersmell  are the same person. ( Click  "Huntersmell" above to read my previous posting on Huntersmell. ) I detected some similarities in their drawing styles. But who can be sure? Thank that I have found another talented bara artist. That's what matters.

This is Mr.  Pontaro 's cover art for Samson March, 2003. Since he stopped contributing his mastery in any gay scene, at least I believe so, all I can do is to search anyting left. (C) Pontaro Luckily, I had a chance to read through some pages of his comics, Urisen , which were not included in the version found in the web. The web version indicates that some episodes are missing, for the characters seem to know each other in the first scene. Still, I have not found whole part of the comics. Hope to have a chance to read the whole comics soon.

Dopey is a Korean Bara artist, who is regularly posting his works via Twitter (ID: DoPq). (c) Dopey I am using the word, " Bara artist" to refer Asian artists who draw gay erotic art. However, I have come to know that some artists, including Mr. Gengoroh Tagame , the King of Japanese gay erotic art, prefer to be called "gay erotic artist." Using the word does not mean that I am not aware of the ambivalent meaning of " Bara ". Still, using the word can save time, considering this blog is written in English. Back to the artist Dopey , I found that he has provided his artworks for iSHAP , Korean AIDS prevention center for LGBTs, so that the center can make various goods to promote awareness of AIDS. Talented and serving for the community, how nice of him!👍

The following is the cover art of Samson , a Japanese gay magazine, which Mr. Pontaro drew more than two decades ago. (c) Pontaro Mr. Pontaro  does not seem to be active anywhere in the Japanese gay scene, therefore I cannot find any new work of his, or hear any news about him. Could I come across other fans who can share their knowledge on this talented artist, if I keep on posting articles about him? Maybe. Who would know? At least I can make more people get to know about this master of daddy illustrations. If you know any news of the artist, leave a reply here, please.

Though beloved by Bara fans, Mr. Pontaro does not have any Wikipedia page. Even the information on his contributions to the Japanese gay magazines such as Samson (サムソン) or Sabu (さぶ) is very limited. I tried to dig up any info from the DB files from now-closed Doujinsh and Manga Lexicon , but the better result could be found at the "Back Issues" pages of Samson . You can search the infos in the following link and you can search infos on the back issues from different years. http://www.kaimeikan.co.jp/samson/samson_bk2004.html   Following is the list of his works, the best that I can offer right now. 1. Cover arts for Samson Mr. Pontaro drew covers for Samson from 2003 to 2004. His first cover for Samson is as follows. (c) Pontaro The man in the cover wears a Santa Claus hat, for Japanese publishers tend to issue magazines months earlier. The January issue featuring the cover must have been out in the stores in November or December of 2002. 2. Comics Though incomplete, these...

Recently I found a fascinationg drawing by Mr. Daisuke Takakura . *Beware that there is another Daisuke Takakura , who is a renowned photographer. I had the chance to look through his works before. But those works did not fascinate me much like the following drawing, even though all his works are very skillfully drawn. Some of his works are very realistic, almost like he drew or traced from real pictures. (c) 高蔵大介(Takakura, Daisuke) (detail) But other works are drawn like comics, which makes it hard to realize that all those works are from the same artist. He did not have any Japanese Wikipedia page, so I don't have much information about him. He is just introduced as an artist who from time to time contributed illustrations to the Japanese gay magazines such as  Samson and Sabu . Some of his works can be found in the Gengoroh Tagame 's erotic art compilation book, Gay Erotic Art in Japan Vol. 3 . (c) 田亀源五郎(Tagame Gengoroh) et al I hope to have more chance to see vintage...

  Jiraiya has released his new comic, Shichifukutou , roughly translated as Seven-luck Island, once again through a doujinshi called Otokomatsuri . Teppei (right) and his senior cameraman(left) find themselves on the way to Shichifukutou to cover the secret ceremony of this remoted island. They have no clue that the coverage comes with being nude, drinking and having sex with audiences. Jiraiya has teased his Instagram followers for more than a year with some drawings of this work. Otokomatsuri Vol. 19 , the doujinshi  featuring the comic, began to be shipped at the end of this October. Good news: As of 8 November, 2022, some copies are still available. 『漢祭（おとこまつり）』第１９号 - mitsuwabldg - BOOTH Bad news for Jiraiya fans overseas: They do not ship the item overseas and you should find way to have it delivered to an address within Japan and then be delivered to your home. The site recommends transfer service such as Tenso or Buyee. However, you can also find other companies cha...

In Juta 22 Y.O. , 2017 comic by Jiraiya , a young salaryman ( Masaru ) gets a gay porn VHS from his friend to find that the cover model resembles his married-with-three-kids co-worker ( Kousuke ). In this setting, Masaru would usually confront and end up having sex with Kousuke . The writer, however, twisted the story a little bit and put Masaru to travel across time and/or universe. Who would Masaru meet in the alternative universe? What would happen to these two co-workers?   The comic is only available through comic compilation called  Kansai (Otoko-matsuri) #2 , which is out-of-print and is found only at a few second-hand bookstores in Japan . I can guess that Kansai is a male-themed festival, otoko-matsuri , and the book was sold during the festival in 2017.

In Otonarisann , which means a Mr/Ms Neighbor, by Osamu Kodama , Yoshio (left) and and his living-next-door neighbor Kenzou (right) find themselves bumping into each other after they lose wives by the same accident. (c) Pontaro How would they manage to keep their lives straight? What would happen to these two middle-aged men? Only text version with no illustration is available in the Kindle store of Amazon Japan .

Jiraiya 's 2019 comic, Yokozuna Sensei , which can be translated as Sir Yokuzuna  or Yokozuna Teacher roughly, is on sale again through BigGym Online Shop . (https://www.biggym.co.jp/bg-online/co-bgo-j003.html) One thing I cannot be sure is if they ships the item overseas. I remember they only explain shipping and handling fee for dwellers of Japan . (c) Jiraiya (2019) The uncensored French version of the comic by Gachimuchi-Editions is, unfortunately, out-of-stock already. This is the story of Morita Kingo a.k.a.  Sir Yokozuna (left), elementary school teacher and undefeated Sumo champion in the neighbor and three local men he encounters:  Sumiyoshi the osteopath, Urashima the painter, and Momouchi the police officer (left to right). To my understanding, in Japan, the national Sumo champion is called Yokozuna . That is how the teacher is called such in this story.

Good news! Jiraiya's comic, Tokyo 1964 is still available for free if you purchase certain Jiraiya goods, mostly t-shirts, from Nippondanji Shop (nippondanji.net). Read details from the magazine section of the site. Kazushi (left) is a wrestler and  Kirio (right), a weightlifter. Both of them are on the Japanese national team for the summer Olympics held in Tokyo . They are supposed to concentrate on each's game. The fact they are thrown into one dorm, however, does not do good in their practices, yet.  (c) Jiraiya (All images are used for informational purpose.)

The animated feature film, Flee, is running in local theaters as “Na-ui Jib-eun Eodi-inga?” The Korean title means “where is my home?”  The distributor seems to change the title from Flee or Flugt, emphasizing one of the lines of the protagonist, saying home is where he does not have to leave anymore. The young boy who used to dress up in his sisters’ clothes, has to move from country to country, but still does not feel safe because he has to lie that he lost all his family not to be evicted. The sufferings and the web of lies kept on suffocating him. But in the end he found peace thanks to his family and his partner.  The movie is very calm in delivering the journey of the protagonist. The story, however, took my breath away. Thank God I found this movie while running in theater. 

Kyoutou to Futari-kiri , which means just me and the vice principal , is another vintage erotic novel by Osamu Kodama . (c) Sansuke Yamada Original publication comes with illustrations by Sansuke Yamada . I haven't had the chance to read the original publication, so cannot be sure if the image above was actually used or not. However, they look like the ones in the illustration of the first page of the original publication. The man in the right, Yamashita , is a gym teacher in a high school, and the man in the left is a vice principal of the same school. Both of them were on a preliminary visit for the upcoming school field trip. And the vice principal makes his move bit by bit to get his hands on Yamashita . Will he succeed? If he does, how far he would go?

Recently I found numerous artworks by Sansuke and Pontaro , which were used for novels by Osamu Kodama . Some of the novels are included in the Kindle Unlimited category (Amazon Japan), which lead me to subscribe Kindle Unlimited. (c) Pontaro The image above was used for one of the novels I found at Kindle, BANKCRUPTCY , when it was published originally in print. Sadly, the works by Kodama I found at Kindle have zero illustrations. The man in the left recently had to close his company due to economic crisis, borrowed money from a bar owner, where he had frequented for years, and was seduced to have sex with him in return. He turned it down.. for a while, but after he was helped again in finding a new job at a onsen where he found gay customers and got caught by the bar owner while trying to have his first experience with a man, he couldn't find any excuse to refuse.. (Of course, he still CAN refuse.. but we know that is not how the story goes.) The man in the right, who is a CEO ...

Twitter has been an amazing source to come across amazing artists. Tooboshoo is, as you can tell from one of his works, very talented in drawing bulky and muscular men. Not sure if he is Chinese or Taiwanese. All I know is he's refering himself as Tang Bing in his instargram. Hoping to keep on seeing his works from now on. (C) Tooboshoo (picture taken from his Twitter)

About two weeks ago, I came to know that Mr. Yamada’s art exhibition was being held in Tokyo. And that they were selling the Art Book!!! Even though it is a shame that all of his works are somewhat censored for the book, I still feel lucky to have the book before it goes out of print. 

For a couple of years, I stopped posting anything new to this blog, and then I totally forgot my ID and password for this blog. But now that I’ve found a way to access, thank God, I can start over.

Recently I had a chance to read Ramuneikki by Sansuke Yamada. If you have read my previous posts, you would know, by now, how I love his artwork. His artwork, though seemingly raw and simple, is very lively and well-proportioned. (c) Sansuke Yamada, photo from Amazon(Japan) I almost bought this book just because he drew some figures for the book. Anyway, Ramuneikki is filled with short stories which were previously published through magazines. Each time I turned the page, I was suprised to see how freely his mind goes when he creates. I ENVY him!!

I did not know till today that Jiraiya released his newest comic, Two Hoses, a story about two firemen, through Big Gym (in Japan) and Massive (in US). The picture above is from Big Gym (a gay store chain in Japan) twitter. As you can see, this comic seemed to be based on his previous artwork, which was used for several items. (I really love this artwork, even though I generally love his artwork. Actually I love all of his artworks.)  The 2nd image seems to be a promotional postcard. And the 3rd image is the US version of the comic. The image is from Massive.

I posted her previous work, Lies are a gentleman's manners. I also purchased another work of hers, Almost Paradise. It was set in a high school in a small city. And a new art teacher and one student became more closer than they expected. The book also contains another story featuring sort of a werewolf and a wizard, I recalled. The story and artwork are very impressive. But the thing is that she does not release many materials.