[YeitSuda] The Power of Comics Reviving Dying Small Towns

Sakaiminato City in Tottori Prefecture, Japan, with a population of 30,000, was once a thriving fishing town but faced the brink of economic collapse due to industrial decline and population decrease. In the 1980s, the population grew to nearly 40,000, but when the bubble economy burst and a long-term recession began, Sakaiminato had no choice but to face a moment of decline.

Yokai Village established in Sakaiminato City, Tottori Prefecture, Japan.
[Photo by Naeil Tour]

In the early 1990s, Kurome Tomonori, a cultural affairs official at the city hall, proposed installing statues of yokai (monsters) from the works of Mizuki Shigeru, a writer native to the area, as a tourism resource development idea. Local residents and merchants strongly opposed the idea. They argued that erecting statues of yokai, which have a negative image, would spoil the aesthetics and that people would be too scared to walk around at night. Kurome personally visited each resident to persuade them. Moved by his dedication, one grandmother allowed the installation of a yokai statue in front of her house, which led other residents to give their consent. In 1993, a total of 23 yokai statues were erected. The bizarre statues scattered throughout the town were sometimes damaged or disappeared, either by residents or outsiders, and when this commotion was reported in the media, curiosity grew and tourists began to visit the area.

Among the yokai statues installed on Mizuki Shigeru Road, the main character Kitaro.
[Photo by MIZUKI Productions]

As crowds flocked to the quiet small town to see the yokai statues, residents became convinced that yokai could be a tourism resource and could soon turn the area into a famous spot. They increased the number of yokai statues through fundraising and sponsorships, and with the consent of Mizuki, they received the character copyrights free of charge. The writer was so moved that his yokai characters were helping to revive his hometown that he also generously donated a large sum of money. Currently, there are a total of 153 yokai statues installed in Sakaiminato, and the local shopping street has transformed into Mizuki Shigeru Street. Tottori Prefecture even renamed the nearby Yonago International Airport to Yonago Kitaro Airport, after the manga protagonist Kitaro. Thus, Sakaiminato, reborn as the Yokai Town, has become a popular destination attracting 2 to 3 million tourists annually.

The main characters of 'The Horror Foreign Baseball Team' painted on the Lee Hyun-se Cartoon Street in Maehwa-myeon, Uljin-gun, Gyeongbuk.
[Photo by Uljin-gun]

Maehwa-myeon, Uljin-gun, Gyeongbuk Province, was a quiet village where plum blossoms bloomed under Namsusan Mountain, as its name suggests. Due to climate and local conditions, plum trees gradually decreased, and the population that left for cities in their youth did not recover, leading Maehwa Village down a path of decline. Hwang Chunseop, the head of Maehwa 1-ri, who returned to his hometown after graduating from school in Daegu, felt that his hometown might disappear if things continued as they were. While seeking ways to revive the village, he came up with the idea of turning the comics of Lee Hyun-se, a native of the area, into murals as a tourism resource. Hwang and the residents tracked down the artist’s relatives and visited Seoul to persuade the artist directly, eventually creating the Lee Hyun-se Comic Street.

The 1 km-long wall is filled with 400 panels from the artist’s representative works, including “The Horror Foreign Baseball Team,” “Nambul,” “Daughter-in-law Rice Flower,” and “Comic Samgukji.” The Nambul Train Cafe, converted from a train, evokes old memories. The once quiet rural village is emerging as a new tourist destination as generations nostalgic for the artist’s works and young tourists with retro tastes gradually visit. Amid the accelerating population cliff and the looming crisis of local extinction, the power of comics as content to revive small local cities is expected to expand further, supported by the growing influence of webtoons.

Editor's NoteYeitsuda (藝It Suda) is an abbreviation for “talk about art,” a column focusing on issues and trends in the arts, including music, fine arts, and performances.