Roland Kelts / Special to The Daily Yomiuri
An estimated 105,000 fans attended last month's combined
New York Anime Festival and Comic Con--and you couldn't walk a meter on the
convention floor without seeing or literally bumping into someone in
costume.
The larger North American anime conventions feature artists and
voice actors from Japan and the United States as celebrity guests,
screenings, panels and live performances alongside booths offering
merchandise and promotional paraphernalia.
But cosplay, an import from Japan that involves wearing, and often
posing provocatively in, a homemade costume of your favorite character,
may be the biggest draw.
"It's like total escape," a teenager from Philadelphia said as he
adjusted the collar of his costume, based on a character from
Hetalia:
Axis Powers, a notably popular title this year. "You can't do this every
day. And it's really addictive."
The appeal of cosplay outside Japan is a perfect example of the
transcultural boomerangs that characterize much of contemporary popular
culture. As Japanese otaku of an older generation will tell you,
cosplay, and the devotional fandom behind it, came from the United
States: Photos of costumed fans at North American sci-fi conventions,
such as those revolving around
Star Trek, appeared in magazines imported
to Japan in the 1960s and '70s.
Japanese readers adopted the practice, using characters from their
homegrown anime and manga series. As the popularity of manga and anime
spiked outside Japan, fast-evolving Internet access provided overseas
fans first with a peephole and then a massive window onto what looked
like an enticing made-in-Japan phenomenon. The word itself, cosplay, is a
giddy transcultural mashup of the English "costume" and "play."
"Cosplay [is now] a more accepted hobby in North America than in
Japan," noted
Riddle Lee, an Atlanta-based costume designer and model
who has been cosplaying for 12 years. Lee cited the variety of genres
beyond anime and manga--comics, movies and the sci-fi subgenre
steampunk--that have become a part of the cosplay scene in the United
States.
"It allows more ethnicities and age ranges to be involved. But those
who are cosplaying from anime and Japan-based videogames really do have
a sincere interest in Japan."
Photographer Ejen Chuang agrees. In 2009, Chuang crisscrossed the
United States, attending six anime conventions to shoot over 1,650
cosplayers, 250 of whom appear in his colorful and hefty coffee-table
tome,
"Cosplay in America," published last year.
"Many cosplayers I've talked to and photographed have since moved to
Japan, either for studies or jobs," he said. "They wouldn't put so much
effort into their outfits if they did not respect the original source."
For some, cosplay has become serious stuff. "The skills
involved--sculpting, styling, sewing, makeup--could help get you a
career in fashion or film," Lee said.
She has turned her own skill set toward charity. In the wake of the
March 11 tsunami and earthquake, Lee launched
"Cosplay for a Cause," a
nonprofit organization whose mission is to raise money for disaster
relief. She contacted artists and fellow cosplayers worldwide to create a
glossy
2012 calendar, with all proceeds going directly to the Japanese
Red Cross Society.
"Japan has been such an influence on my life," she explains, "from
video games to anime characters to food and even its rich history, which
fascinates me."
A New Jersey-based cosplayer known by the moniker
Yuffiebunny told
me that her passion has led to her own business,
Head Kandi, creating
hand- and custom-made costume headpieces, wigs and other hair
enhancements. She also judges cosplay contests, models for Web sites and
magazines, sometimes gets hired as a cosplayer for events--and, of
course, attends anime conventions regularly.
While cosplaying is not a career for her, she says, "It's definitely not a sideline or part-time gig. I work very hard at it."
Yaya Han, also from Atlanta, and Chicago-based
Barbara Staples both
tell me that cosplaying and its related activities (designing costumes
and accessories on commission, modeling, public speaking and attending
conventions) have taken over their lives full-time.
Han said American cosplayers are not only diverse in age, gender and
ethnicity, but also in levels of devotion. She divides participants
into three groups: The super amateurs, who "know nothing about proper
sewing techniques, props, wigs, et cetera"; the Halloween types, out for
"occasional fun"; and the true devotees, members of the "cosplay
community [who] make cosplay a lifestyle."
Staples, 29, attended her first anime convention 14 years ago, and
like many women of her generation, was lured by the watershed shojo
anime series Sailor Moon. She now runs her own costume design business,
Lemonbrat, employing six staffers and two interns.
"I feel like I'm working two full-time jobs," she said, "because it takes up so much time."
Americans who cosplay have skewed both younger and older in recent
years, with teens now sporting anime and manga costumes alongside
cosplayers going gray or even fluffy white. They are drawn to the spirit
of interactivity, role-playing participation and community, plus a dose
of sincere passion--all emanating from a pop culture universe thousands
of miles away.
Staples didn't cosplay at her first convention. "I didn't realize
people dressed up," she told me. "Then I noticed and thought, 'I can
make better costumes than that.' Cosplay was right on the cusp of
becoming really popular."
===
Kelts is a visiting scholar at the University of Tokyo who divides
his time between Tokyo and New York. He is the author of
"Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture has Invaded the U.S.", and the forthcoming novel, "Access."
[
@Yomiuri here]
