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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 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!!

According to Japanese Wikipedia, the most recent comics from Jiraiya are following: 青い空 入道雲 通り雨【前編】（216号 2014年1月） 青い空 入道雲 通り雨【後編】（217号 2014年2月） 恋人たちのありふれたやりとり（236号 2015年9月） (c) Jiraiya (from his personal blog) This seems to be the cover page of first comics (part 1 and 2), whose title seems to mean "blue sky, fleecy clouds, and passing rain." Jiraiya explains on his blog that A(on the left) lives with C(on the left) and B(in the middle) is a father of C. I don't know how the story would go. And the following image is one of scenes of second comics, whose title seems to mean "lovers' very common give and take" or something. (c) Jiraiya (from his personal blog) As you can see, it has been a while since he published new comic. But my post on his comic is one of the most popular posts among mine and this motivated me to write this article. He regularly updates his works and everything on his personal blog but only in JAPANESE. :) Happy new year, guys.

For last month, my article about Pontaro was the most popular one among my posts. See the link. Click the link That's why I decided to post another article on Pontaro . I found that he draw covers of Samson , a Japanese gay magazine, all through 2003 and 2004. I could not find wikipedia page of his in Japanese wikipedia so all I could find about him is from Doujinshi & Manga Lexicon. I guess that he chose his penname ' Pontaro ' from a Japanese word, ぽん太郎(written as pontarou, but sounded as pontaroː with long "o"), meaning a fool, as a joke.

I found this gorgeous illustration while surfing Jiraiya. The illustration is from Brute & Brawn . (Click to visit the site.) I don't know how to call him but his work is magnificent. He is kind enough to post his drawing and painting steps. Go and visit his blog from the link.

Ramunne Ikki(ラムネイッキ) is a now out-of-print short stories compilation of Sansuke Yamada(山田参助). Some of his previous works are newly published by major publishers after he got more famous after his Areyo Hoshikuzo . But this one is not yet. Ramune refers a bottled lemonade widely sold throughout Japan. Ikki means "at once" or in this context, "bottoms up," I guess. The book is described as "hard cover" in Amazon Japan. And one of the customers reviewed that "cover is not the only thing that is hard..." Maybe Japaneses also refer something extreme as "hard" as Koreans do. This is how "Ramune" looks like. By the way, I want the book so badly. Maybe Mr. Yamada re-release the book.

Recently I had a chance to read some of Howard Cruse's works. He is renowned for his work, Stuck Rubber Baby , but instead, I grabbed From Headrack to Claude , thinking short stories would be easier to understand, which turned out to be a huge mistake. The stories were somewhat hard to get it. I didn't know where to laugh and why the stories went that way.. I found some hard time to relate to the stories. Anyway, it was a pleasure to see each frame. He used dots to express shades and it could have taken some time, I suppose. Unique. This time, I am thinking of trying Wendel, one of his comic strip series.

(c) 熊八 Kumahachi is a talented Taiwanese bara artist. His works are so amazing and I was instantly fascinated. He seemed to sell his works as Doujinshi(self-published book).

Los Amantes Pasajeros is latest Almodovar film. A couple of months ago, I watched the trailer of this movie, in which 3 male flight attendants dance and lip-sync to dance music like queens. After that I longed to watch this film for months. The movie was run last year in many countries and even the title was released as DVD. But there is no sign of releasing in Korea.

1st comic anthology by Puu suke Kuma da. Kuma means a bear and Puu sounds like one of the most famous bears in the world, Winnie the Pooh. He has published his comic strips through Japanes gay magazines for years till now. And this is the 1st comic anthology. (After this book, he released two more anothologies.) This book is out of print in many Japanese bookstores, but luckily I could purchase new book recently. The unfortunate thing is that I can't read Japanese that well to enjoy this comic 100 %.

Comics compilation by Kazuhide Ichigawa(市川和秀). Various affairs were portrayed in this book: those of between sports team mates, between colleagues and so on.

Original title is "同性パートナー生活読本―同居・税金・保険から介護・死別・相続まで", which means "Same sex partner life handbook : from living together, tax and insurance to care, bereavement and inheritance". I bought this book while I was visiting Tokyo two years ago. The book is written by a Japanese gay activist, I suppose. I hope for a Korean version of this book, 'cause laws are different per countries.

Recently, I had a chance to visit Japan briefly. During the stay, I took very very short time off to visit Convoy , one of the Japanese rainbow shops, which sells new goods and used goods. Below are the books I found. I can't say that I bought them at very cheap price. At Amazon market place, they sell these books at extremely low price. But they usually don't ship used goods to other countries. I am not sure if Japanese seller are not familiar with selling goods overseas or they are just reluctant because they think that they have to use English when to sell things overseas. Not like sellers in Japan, there are many sellers who are willing to ship things overseas. For example I have bought several times from the sellers of Amazon UK or Amazon US. Anyway, it's not easy for me to buy these used goods from Japanese sellers. They usually don't ship items overseas. I am not sure if proxy shipping service companies would dispatch these gay-related items , ...

Suk-chun Hong is the first out Korean celebrity. After his coming out in 2000, he was banned from TV for 3 years. But he survived it and became owner of many famous restaurant in Itaewon(one strict of Seoul where there are many gay places), father to his nephew and niece(he adopted his sister's siblings after she got divorced) and iconic figure in Korean queer community. He appeared one of the famous talk shows, Healing Camp recently and shared his love story, the reason of coming out and how he dealt with the result. He got emotional several times during the show but he also shared his experiences which many Korean gay people can relate to, I suppose.

Jiraiya is releasing another comic anthology. But it is a kind of "updated" version of the comic book which was released years ago (see below). The newer version contains 3 more comics which were released after the 1st version's release. And it also contains various new stuffs, says Jiraiya.

Recently I bought iPod touch. I installed some apps for gays. Ie scruff and grindr. I got shocked how open and proud korean gays are. So many pics from those who are not afraid or shamed of who they are. So impressed I am.

No Regret is a Korean queer movie. One is an orphan who became sex worker. And the other is rich boy with a secret agenda and fiancee!!!! This movie is very intense in every way. I have watched it before and I bought the 2-disk DVD yesterday. But I am not sure when I watch this movie. Even though I'm a huge fan of queer movies, intense queer movies make me feel uneasy. "Just Friends"' director produced this movie.