TOUMA 10th Anniversary Exhibition & Knuckle Bear Custom Show @ Few Many (Jan 30)

TOUMA will be holding a 10th Anniversary Exhibition & Knuckle Bear Custom Show @ Few Many, opening January 30th and exhibiting thru February 5th, 2012. TOUMA will be the only artist customizing Knuckle Bears for the exhibition, and posted here is a peek at what to expect. (Wow, a decade! Congratulations, Touma-san!)

I've always wanted a Knuckle Bear, and have on numerous occasions let slip the opportunity to score one - from mini figurines from Toy2R to huge 18 inch behemoths. Nevertheless, I had to ask TOUMA about the origins of Knuckle Bear!


[One day I'll find and own these Knuckle Bears from Toy2R]
TOUMA: I got inspirations from the Japanese folktale called "Kintarō".

Kintaro is a story about a little boy who would throw away a huge bear, so I created a figure that has the sarcastic meaning of what Kintaro did was impossible. In my version, the bear was so angry and pinned down the little boy. When CEO of Toy2R HongKong saw that piece without any information of Kintaro, he liked the bear without Kintaro and produced the bear as the Knuckle Bear in 2003.


TOUMA: I used to work as a character designer at a game company, and there was a polygon limit of 500 back then (I think you can use a few thousand polygons now). Creating a character with 500 polygons was like a puzzle. I really had to learn where to use and not to use the polygons. That style is shown in the Knuckle Bear as well. It has the curvy smooth lined head and the belly, and very edgy hands and legs. My style of combining the curvy lines and the edgy lines were originated from this background.


[L-R: Wonderwall 2009 / Endangered Species Dunny /
MTV Asia Awards 2006 promo Qee from Toy2R / Pics via touma.biz]