Interest
Tezuka's Tokiwa-so Ceiling Doodle Will Head to Museum
posted on by Lynzee Loveridge
A ceiling board from the demolished Tokiwa-so apartment, once doodled on by Osamu Tezuka when he was a resident, is now in safe keeping at the Toshima Ward Office. The drawing shows Tezuka's personification of himself at his work desk with Princess Knight's Sapphire above him. Tezuka drew the art in 1982 after hearing about plans for the building to be destroyed.
The art was donated by the Ikebukuro Police Station's press club on February 26. It measures approximately 90 centimeters by 30 centimeters (35.5 inches by 11.8 inches). The piece may be viewable to the public soon; the ward office is considering donating the piece to the Tokiwa-so Manga Museum in Toshima. The museum is planned to open in a reconstructed version of Tokiwa-sō, an apartment building famous for housing some of Japan's most renowned early manga artists, including Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy), Fujio Akatsuka (Tensai Bakabon), Fujiko Fujio (Doraemon) and Shōtarō Ishinomori (Kamen Rider).
"It's a valuable piece in which Mr. Tezuka put his heart into. It should breathe life into the facility," Toshima ward Mayor Yukio Takano said.
The museum was slated to open on March 22 but due to coronavirus concerns, the opening was pushed back to April 1 or later.
Tezuka isn't the only artist to doodle in soon-to-be demolished buildings. Manga creators Naoki Urasawa (Monster), Fujiko Fujio A (Doraemon), and Masami Yuuki (Patlabor, Birdy the Mighty) left their marks in Shogakukan, Inc.'s former building in 2013 prior to its demolition.
Source: The Mainichi (Hironori Tsuchie)
