東京和它老去的店面

Tokyo Storefront

藝術家Mateusz Urbanowicz生於波蘭，目前居住在日本。他也是我們先前報道的另一個水彩畫系列《自行車男孩》（Bicycle Boy）的作者。才華橫溢的他以細膩精緻且清新生動的畫風而聞名，更曾為許多動漫和電影創作背景插畫，包括廣受好評的電影《你的名字》（Your Name）。今年，Mateusz表達了他專註創作自己的藝術作品的希望。他將去年已有10張作品的《東京店面》（Tokyo Storefront）系列進行了增補，並將以雙語書的形式面向大眾，其中將包括最初的10幅插圖以及40幅新創作的作品。

Polish-born and Japan-based artist Mateusz Urbanowicz is the talented illustrator and painter behindBicycle Boy, a series we』ve previously featured on Neocha. Known for his vivid usage of watercolors and eye for detail, Urbanowicz has worked as the background artist for many anime TV shows and movies over the years, including the critically acclaimedYour Name. This year, Urbanowicz expressed hopes of shifting more of his attention towards personal projects. This reprioritization has led to a continuation of the ten-partTokyo Storefrontseries that he released last year. The extension to the series comes in the form of a bilingual book that includes the original ten illustrations along with 40 new drawings.

「我搬到東京的前3年，連散步時都會很驚訝，因為一直會偶遇在那些已經很老舊的建築中仍在營業的商店。在日本神戶，地震摧毀了許多老城區的房子和商店，但在東京它們還屹立不倒。」Mateusz的《東京店面》系列正是想要記錄下這些風景。

「When I moved to Tokyo more than three years ago, I was really surprised that on my walks I encountered so many shops still in business inside really old buildings. Differently to Kobe, where the earthquake wiped out a lot of these old downtown houses and shops, in Tokyo they still survive,」 Urbanowicz recalls, and inspired by their beauty,Tokyo Storefrontis his attempt to document these charming buildings.

這系列的大多數店鋪，Mateusz都是在東京閑逛時偶然發現的，但畫中不僅僅只是紀實。正如這張畫上方的圓形標誌，在Mateusz前去這家店之前，商標就已經不幸被拆了，當Mateusz到達那裡的時候只能拍一些照片，再不得不用互聯網上找到的舊照片，在畫中把商標加上去。而其中一張照片里，商店門前放著一把小椅子，細節如它，當然不能被忽視，Mateusz把它也畫了上去。

The majority of the storefronts featured in the book comes from Urbanowicz』s exploration of Tokyo. However, his approach is more than a mere recreation of his observations. In the illustration above, Urbanowicz shares that the signage was already torn down when he showed up in his location hunt. Disappointed, he took a few photos of the shop in its current state and went home to scour the internet for old images of the store. In his final illustration, the original signage has been restored in its retro glory, and as a master of details, a small chair he observed in one of the old photos was also included.

Mateusz表示，「我不想照著市面上已有的懷舊導遊冊拷貝，因此在創作過程中我們不得不再次走訪這些地方，拍下更多照片，關注更多細節。這也給了我們和店主交流的機會，深入了解到店鋪背後有趣的歷史。」

Commenting on the series, Urbanowicz shares, 「I didn』t want to copy all the retro guides that already exist for Tokyo. Because of that we, of course, had to go again to those places, take more photos, and look more closely at the details of the shops. But that also gave us a chance to talk with the owners to learn more about the interesting history behind each of the shops.」

在以紙質版面世時，《東京店面》將並不僅僅包含東京的店鋪店面，也會有一些店鋪的內部插畫和文字介紹。

目前，《東京店面——Mateusz Urbanowicz繪作》（Tokyo Storefronts – The Artworks of Mateusz Urbanowicz）系列已經可以在Amazon上預售。

In the upcoming book, Urbanowicz not only explores Tokyo shop facades but will also include historical details presented in both English and Japanese as well as sketches of shop interiors.

Tokyo Storefronts– The Artworks of Mateusz Urbanowicz is now available for pre-order on Amazon.

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