Sanshi Funayama (船山三四, Funayama Sanshi, c. 1920s – c. 1999) was a Japanese homoerotic fetish artist. Funayama, along with Go Mishima, Tatsuji Okawa, and Go Hirano, is regarded by artist and historian Gengoroh Tagame as a central figure in the first wave of contemporary gay artists in Japan. ^[1]

Biography

Funayama's artwork first appeared in the early 1960s in Fuzokukitan [ ja], a fetish magazine that published gay content alongside straight and lesbian content. He later contributed to Bara, a private circulation gay magazine, and Barazoku, the first commercially published gay magazine in Japan. ^[1]

From the 1970s until the late 1990s, Funayama disappeared from public life, and did not publish or circulate art for over three decades. ^[2] In 1999, he resurfaced to submit two illustrations to the magazine G-men, with a promise to submit additional works. No further works were submitted by Funayama which, combined with his presumed advanced age, led his contemporaries to assume he had died. ^[3]

Little is known about Funayama's private life. Married with a daughter, ^[3] Funayama worked as a police officer; he drew while on night shift, and kept his illustrations in his work locker. ^[2] He was an acquaintance of the writer Yukio Mishima, who would visit Funayama while in Kansai. ^[2]

Style and Impact

Funayama is noted for his depictions of "macho-type" men, often in extreme scenarios involving BDSM, torture, and graphic violence. Police officers appear frequently in his work. ^[2]

Funayama is a favorite artist of Gengoroh Tagame, who has praised Funayama's works as "one of the peaks in gay erotic art." ^[1]

See also

• Homosexuality in Japan

References

This Japanese artist–related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e