In the post-year 2000 New York City, the notion of the artist-driven metropolis has slowly given way to the rising tide of the corporate imperative. Mom and Pop coffee shops wither under the unrelenting assault being waged by Starbucks and local fashion trends increasingly seem to hinge upon what’s cheapest at The Gap. The most striking feature of the new New York is the apparently bulletproof acceleration of the cost of renting an apartment in Manhattan—now only rivaled by the newly pricey environs of Brooklyn (once the refuge of renters in search of affordable housing near Gotham proper). As for purchasing real estate, artists who previously found Bed Stuy and Williamsburg a viable option have largely been priced out, as one-bedroom apartments have quickly passed the $1 million mark. 

While some local artists continue to stick it out—piling into apartment shares that are packed so full of humanity the inhabitants can no longer reasonably call each other roommates, but rather, dormitory partners—a startlingly large number of artists have opted to move out of the country to cities supposedly more friendly to cost-of-living concerns. Topping the list for most are London, Amsterdam, Prague and now Berlin. But for others looking to shake off the familiarity of the West, Japan has emerged as a newly attractive locale in which to feed one’s artistic muse while managing to get in three square meals-a-day and keep a roof over one’s head. 

Graphic artist, and native New Yorker, Josh McKible is one among many in this new class of “global citizens” endeavoring to put author Thomas Friedman’s “the world is flat” theory to the test. Originally born Upstate in Newburgh, N.Y., McKible earned a BFA at the prestigious School of the Art Institute of Chicago in sculpture and soon moved into painting and constructing kinetic, mechanical installations. After school, the winds of post-undergrad change led the artist to try his hand at package design—for porn. “An uncle working at Penthouse magazine introduced me to the art director who offered me an entry level design position,” said McKible. “I sold all my tools, dumped records, clothing and books and moved to NYC in 11 days. This was in 1994.” 

Since then, McKible has gone on to become one of the most sought after visual artists in publishing; his art regularly graces the pages of GQ, The New York Times, Newsweek, Rolling Stone, Esquire, Fortune, National Geographic, Men’s Fitness UK, Travel + Leisure and Popular Science. “I wound up moving through a series of magazines from designer to Art Director at a few different titles,” said McKible. “I thought I had made it to the pinnacle when I landed a gig at a major weekly news magazine whose name rhymes with ‘crime.’ What I found however was a place reminiscent of high school ... I should be grateful for the experience at least in that it was horrible enough to make me want to buck that career track and take off in a different direction. I had essentially stopped doing any drawing or painting while I was concentrating on being a graphic designer so it was kind of a desperation move to leap off into doing illustration. I had to retrain myself, I wasn’t really ready when I started out. In general, not being ready for something is a good way of knowing if you’ll be any good at it.”

NY Press: You’ve indicated in the past that your move to Japan was prompted by Bush winning a second term. Was part of your reason for leaving a kind of political protest? 

Josh McKible: Actually, we left in October ’04, right before the election. For me at least, the writing was pretty clearly written on the walls that Bush would get re-elected. Fear always seems to win out in politics and, besides, Kerry was an awful choice for the Democrats. I could barely bring myself to get excited about him. So, on one side I saw Bush & Co. taking a mostly willing America down to its ruin (yeah, I believe they have pretty much irreparably changed it for the worst), and the tepid Democratic response on the other side, basically falling over each other to support the war in Iraq. I consider myself to be a patriot and I love the liberal traditions of America—the shining city on the hill (it used to be) and all that, but I couldn’t stand to see what it was doing to itself. So leaving wasn’t so much a political protest as an act of self-preservation. 

I could stay and be consumed, daily, by rage at what I saw and heard or leave and attempt to get a bit of perspective on it. I’m a lot happier now being out of it. As far as public declarations of stars and others to leave ... whatever. I suppose mine was more of a “silent” protest. Although, in a small, but real way I think our decision does have some impact ... even though our tax dollars still support things we might not agree with, we’re now living and spending our money in a country that has a much greater commitment to recycling, more frugal use of resources and doesn’t consider poverty to be a crime or result of immorality. Of course, all those points could be challenged one by one, but I see a lot less SUV’s cruising the streets here than back in Brooklyn.  

Do you think the gentrification of NYC is hurting our local art scene? 

JK: I spent 10 years in NYC and all of it, expect for a brief, tragic episode in Jersey City, in Brooklyn. Oh, and a couple of years in Queens. Manhattan was always out of my price range. Or at least what I was willing to pay. Same thing happened to Brooklyn, at least anywhere within an easy late night drunken cab ride back from Manhattan. Our last apartment in NYC was in Prospect Heights. It was big and (relatively) cheap, but the building was a wreck and I got tired of stepping around the chicken bones and empty 40 ounce bottles every morning in front of the place. The trade-off of easy access to Manhattan vs. space vs. price just got to be untenable. And if we couldn’t live in NYC, where the hell else in the States would we live?

Your lines are very modern, clean and almost like still-frames of animation. Some might consider this a nod to Japanese aesthetics. What affect has Japanese culture had on you as an artist?

JK: I was initially interested in Japanese art because of the flatness and visual palette of ukiyo-e, the mechanical aspect/look of it. But since being here I’ve become more interested in things like sumi-e (ink painting) and texture, the mark of the human hand. I also want to somehow emulate what I feel is the very Japanese approach of visual overload and crazy detail which is then isolated by areas of simplicity, of white space. I feel it in the traditional architecture as well as the civic spaces. And the dramas on TV. Kind of hard to describe, but it’s like 40 minutes of quiet followed by 10 minutes of intense shouting. It’s more binary, more on and off, more stretched out and then a sudden bunching of detail. It’s like watching Spock freak out.

The newly relaunched Japanese version of  Tokion magazine seems to be geared toward exposing the local expatriate artist community. Have you connected with the expat/gaijin artist community in Tokyo?  

JK: Well no, not yet. For one thing, illustration is a fairly solitary profession, unlike graphic design, which is almost always a committee process. Now I’m just the boss of me and that’s how I like it. Also, for our first year and a half we lived way up in the Japanese Alps, in a lovely town called Takayama. A gorgeous place, but bitterly cold in the winter and six hours by car outside of Tokyo. It really is a lovely town, but too far away from “civilization.” Also, we have a one-year-old daughter now and I’d like her to grow up seeing other gaijin faces besides just mine. So six months ago we moved here to Chigasaki, which is mid-sized city on the beach in the Shonan area and only an hour by train outside of Tokyo. As Tokyo is to Manhattan, Chigasaki is to the Jersey Shore. But with much thinner sunbathers. Now that we’re more settled, I plan on attempting to make more contact with other gaijin artists in the area.

The New York art community has really embraced Takashi Murakami as a sort of über-authentic representation of what post-modern Japanese art has to offer. What do you think of Murakami’s so-called superflat art movement?  

JK: Well, just like Warhol's factory scene was in the ’60s, it’s just one aspect of what’s going on here. It certainly is an accurate depiction of some of the work being done here, but I think it’s more a reflection of Murakami’s curatorial stance than a “movement.” It does promote a certain view of Japanese art and culture as being detached, disembodied and obsessed with all things otaku but there’s a lot of messier, fleshier, engaged stuff going on in the art and culture than what you might get from just Murakami’s vision. On a personal note however, the book Superflat put out by Murakami, was very helpful in formulating some of my own ideas about my work, particularly in terms of composition and visual narrative. So, I think it’s useful as a way of looking at certain kinds of work, but doesn't reflect all that’s going on here.

Now that you’ve been away for a few years, is there anything that you miss about NYC? 

JK: I miss stinky cheeses, crusty breads, micro-breweries, T-bones, dog runs (as a dog owner), cheap movies—movies here are $18 per ticket at the theater—and lots of public green spaces. I also miss the polyglot of NYC and the directness. But ultimately I miss the helpful nature of NYC folk. Also, NYC is just a gorgeous city architecturally. I don’t miss the crime, the filth, the grasping materialism, the expensive healthcare, the failing public schools and the post-9/11 paranoia.

I’ve often told friends that Tokyo is the closest thing I’ve ever seen to Manhattan in terms of look, feel and the sheer density of the population. What impresses you as the most striking differences between the United States and Japan? 

JK: Oh man, that’s the big one isn’t it? It’s a question both me and my wife, Miyuki, constantly wrestle with. When we first moved here, it was with the intention of only being for a few years, hoping we could ride out the madness back home. We both loved and hated NYC, and we still plan on moving back at some point—but maybe to a different city. But now that we have Nico, our daughter, we’ll be staying in Japan for at least a few years longer than we had initially anticipated. That’s one thing Japan definitely seems to do better ... allow you to raise your kid in a safe, secure environment with inexpensive healthcare that is readily available. Also, kids here don’t need to make “play dates” to see each other; they just do it. Hell, kids can ride the trains here unaccompanied and still be OK. Of course, no place is 100 percent safe and Japan has its share of knife wielding freaks attacking elementary schools, but there’s not the same sense of daily dread here about personal safety.  

Also, the lessons society teaches kids here seem to be more positive: Concern for the feelings of others and respect for the environment. Schools here still have all the things I took for granted when I was growing up, like recess, gym and art and music classes. The elementary educational system seems great, it’s not until junior high and high school that the rote learning and rigid structure get to be too much. The free exchange of ideas in the classroom is still something America does much better. 

The expectation to be able to vigorously debate and defend ideas is something I’d like Nico to grow up having. And America is still a better place for that. That also highlights a huge difference between the two countries. The Japanese seem, for the most part, profoundly apolitical. It’s not like they don’t have their fair share to be pissed about ... every other day a new financial or political scandal is in the news. But for all the lack of street crime, the sheer volume of white-collar crime definitely took me by surprise. 

The other thing is how loud it is here, both in an auditory and a visual sense. Before I came here my mental soundtrack for Japan was a single note on a flute and the “thunk” from a shishiodoshi, one of those see-saw bamboo pipe fountains found in traditional gardens. But the first time I went shopping here, I was quickly disabused of that image ... it’s a constant auditory assault, from the endlessly repeating amplified store jingles, to employees constantly shouting out welcomes and thank you’s on the floor and on the PA system. In supermarkets it’s even worse, where each department—produce, fish, meats—has their own shouting employee, and if that employee is not physically present, then the same announcement is given on an endless repeating loop playing from a boom box. And it’s not just in busy areas like Shibuya, even stores in the middle of “Podunk” Japan have complements of shouting employees either real or recorded.

In the visual realm, every square meter of every commercial district is crawling with signage, all up and down the buildings, across the sidewalk, down the street, everywhere. Even in residential areas the amount of commercial signage can be a little jarring. It's not just the buildings either, every object that is sold comes with its own backstory printed on the surface, usually in some variant of funny Engrish (the colloquial term used to describe humorously modified Japanese to English spellings and pronunciations). One of my prized possessions is a panda shaped wastebasket that asks the question, “Happy Animal! What makes you so happy?” It’s good to be challenged to a philosophical debate by a trash can, but it can get a bit wearying after a while.