Tag Archives: Art Corner

ART CORNER: Beautiful dioramas of model cars from Japan

Takuji is a Japanese artist who places 1:43 and 1:64 scale minicars into beautifully constructed dioramas. From AE86s on touge roads to Mitsubishis tearing through a rally stage to mechanics tuning Skylines in a garage, each scene is a slice of … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: The illustrations of U井T吾

For this installment of JNC‘s Art Corner, we feature another artist from Japan. U井T吾, 27, is a Kyoto-based artist whose day job is in character design for board games and social gaming. Fortunately for us, he’s also an enthusiast of old Japanese … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: Bosozoku Cats and Kyuusha by San Mamiya

San Mamiya is a brilliant artist from Japan that operates mainly on Instagram. With an apparent fondness for old cars, bosozoku cats and the superdeformed style that populates manga, his illustrations exhibit a unique Nihon style that can probably be loosely described as Japanese Ed Roth. 

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ART CORNER: Papercraft nostalgics by Metmania Fan

Got some time to kill? Perhaps the art of papercraft as applied to some JNCs will do the trick. These are the creation of a Japanese artist who goes by the name Metmania Fan, and cover a whole range of … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: Skylines, Truenos and Robots by Matt Spangler

We love it when JNCs pop up in unexpected places, especially when they’re obscure models never sold in the US. Last year, a hakosuka Skyline showed up in Adventure Time. More recently, we received an email from a friend that … Continue reading

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MINICARS: Japan Post celebrates the Mazda MX-5’s 25th anniversary with commemorative stamps

On Monday, the Japan Post released a series of commemorative stamps and a 1:64 diecast car to honor the 25th anniversary of the Mazda Miata and the upcoming debut of the fourth-generation Mazda MX-5 on September 3. We’ll be on hand at … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: Rocket Craft’s stuffed cars are the cutest thing ever

The problem with cars is that they’re made of metal. That means rust, skinned knuckles, and, most importantly, an inability to be cuddly. A shop called Rocket Craft has solved that last one for us by creating a series of stuffed cars, which are totally … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: The custom 1:24 models of Luis Aguilar, Part 01

We met Luis Aguilar at a local AE86 owner gathering and immediately had our brains melted by his astounding 1:24 scale plastic models. It wasn’t just his tremendous attention to detail that caught our eye, but his highly accurate adherence … Continue reading

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MINICARS: Japanese Nostalgic Legos

Apparently, building JNCs out of Legos is a thing. After stumbling upon a Toyota Celica built by -Kyusha-, we fell down the rabbit hole and discovered an entire subculture of nostalgics made of plastic blocks. Here are some of our favorites.

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ART CORNER: So apparently Louis CK was conceived in a Toyota Corona

If you are not yet familiar with comedian Louis CK, do yourself a favor and look up his stuff on YouTube. Artist Jaeil Cho recently drew a comic version of one of CK’s bits about kids asking “why?” ad infinitum. … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: The least resilient Land Cruisers you’ll ever see

Yesterday we saw Toyota FJ40s fetching some high prices at the recent Arizona auctions. These, on the other hand, are the cheapest Land Cruisers you’ll ever encounter. They’re also some of most easily destructible ones too, as they’re made completely out … Continue reading

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ART CORNER: Announcing the JNC Ken & Mary Art Contest winners

This year we held our first ever JNC Art Contest. The theme, “Ken and Mary,” was inspired by the 40th anniversary of the C110 Skyline, and we asked our (extremely talented) readers to submit kenmeri related artwork. Here are the … Continue reading

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Wednesday Wall: Mazda watercolors by Miki Nakajima

The Mazda Japan Facebook page has been posting a series of beautiful watercolor paintings by Mazda designer Miki Nakajima. Subjects range from the 1950 Mazda PB-type three-wheeler to the 1970 RX-500 concept to modern favorites like the MX-5. See the … Continue reading

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Friday Video: Nostalgic Nissan art by Osamu Samurai

Now that we’ve found Mary perhaps it’s appropriate that we share a video full of tricked out kenmeri artwork. Well not a video per se, but these frames of customized Skyline and Fairlady Z renderings by Osamu Samurai are nevertheless killer. They’re … Continue reading

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