Koibito - Gold

Born and raised in Toba, Japan, Yoskay Yamamoto moved to the United States at the age of 15. A self-trained illustrator, Yamamoto's artistic tastes expanded as he fell in love with the urban culture of the West coast. Yamamoto discovered a way to fuse the two different cultural backgrounds together into his work. Yamamoto nostalgically blends pop iconic characters from his new Western home with tradi- tional and mythical Japanese elements, balancing his Asian heritage with urban pop art. Munky King is a Los Angeles-based designer toy company founded in 2003 by Patrick Lam. It began as the first designer toy store in Southern California, located in Chinatown LA, and later expanded to a gallery and flagship store on Melrose Avenue. The company has been instrumental in promoting the designer toy movement through art shows, signings, releases, and special events.   Collaborating with renowned pop-surrealist artists such as Luke Chueh, Joe Ledbetter, Kozyndan, Amanda Visell, COOP, and DabsMyla, Munky King develops art toys that remain true to the original artwork. Their platform toy, the Omi, inspired by Chinese opera masks, exemplifies the fusion of traditional forms with designer toy aesthetics "Once upon a time I had a goldfish named Tuna. But he passed away because of my laziness and mistreatment.... So I painted him for his memory....... But at same time Koibito symbolizes the sense of alienation that I felt growing up in Cali... It''s kind of like the phrase " fish out of water".... I felt and still feel like I don't completely fit in my environment......both in Japan and the US......"