With the rise of cosplayers, can cosplay possibly be considered as a performing art in Singapore?
By Nur Maisarah and Nur Qashrina
What do you think of when I say 'art’ in Singapore? Does cosplay cross your mind?
Cosplay meets city
Anime Festival Asia (AFA), one of the largest anime conventions in Southeast Asia, was first introduced in Singapore in the year 2008 and was held at Suntec Singapore International Convention and Exhibition Centre.
Since then, the number of J-pop culture lovers has been growing as it gained popularity in Singapore. J-pop culture has gotten more attention due to much popular anime and manga series like Naruto and One-piece. That was when cosplay made its grand entrance into the city.
Over 120,000 participants attended the Anime Festival Asia in 2019, with special guests starring J-Pop singers like JUNNA, MYTH & ROID, ReoNa and many more.
(Photo: @animefestivalasia on Instagram)
Geist is the leading cosplay talent management agency based in Singapore which started in June 2018. The company provides a seamless working experience with brands and products with the cosplayers they manage.
Geist works with cosplayers and brands to promote them to an audience interested in anime, pop culture and gaming. Beyond the talents that they manage directly, brands also tap on into their wide network of individual talents that we usually engage with for specific campaigns.
Not only do they operate in Singapore, but they also operate on a bigger scale. Although mainly in Southeast Asia, they also work with international talents and help manage them. So far, they manage seven talents and out of the seven, two of them are from Vietnam and Canada respectively.
We spoke to them to get an idea on how the cosplay community is like in Singapore.
Mr Han, the founder of the cosplay talent management agency, Geist, mentions: “I think the explosion of anime and manga made cosplay become more widely received in the world. The cosplay scene has changed since then. People are more aware of cosplay and right now, I think it is pretty well-known and widespread.”
Now, let’s hear what some cosplayers have to say.
“It’s Halloween for us every day”
Yosuke Sora (not her real name), a renowned cosplayer in Singapore had this to say: “In a way, cosplaying is a performing art. You get into character with make-up, a wig and a costume. There are concepts and storylines. The process is very similar to that of a performance.”
Yosuke, now in her early 20s, never envisioned her love for anime would grow into a deep passion for cosplaying. Never expecting to be renowned for cosplaying with over a hundred thousand followers on Instagram @mr.yosuke.
Growing up, Yosuke never came across to anyone as an extroverted person nor did she dare to stand out from the crowd. Alternatively, she would describe herself as someone who feared judgement - constantly battling doubts such as; What if people judge me? What if they think I’m weird?
However, the doubts she had didn’t matter as her love for anime was stronger - she stepped into the world of cosplaying in 2011 at Anime Festival Asia (AFA) for the first time.
With cosplay forcing her to go to events and meet new people, Yosuke had to face her doubts head-first and learn to speak publicly and with confidence, on top of learning about the concept behind cosplaying characters.
Yosuke Sora was featured as one of the models to introduce UNIQLO’s new line of Manga Uniqlo T-shirt (UT) collection in 2019 and recently this year in September.
(Photo: @uniqlosg on Instagram)
Starking Contrast
Yosuke mainly does cross-dress cosplays, standing out from other cosplayers in Singapore.
Yosuke’s favourite anime is One Piece, one of the highest-grossing media franchises. She cross-dresses as the tritagonist character Ace (left) and as one of the female characters, Nami (right).
(Photo: @mr.yosuke on Instagram)
When we asked why this is what she had to say: “For me, there really isn’t a reason why I cosplay as male characters. It’s more about watching the anime and finding these male characters interesting so I just decided to cosplay them. There aren’t many cosplayers who do this actually. I think I’m very lucky because I do this unique thing of cross-dressing to become male characters. I find myself really standing out.”
However, even with her status as a renowned cosplayer in Singapore, she constantly pushes herself to do better to improve the results of her cosplays.
Yosuke mentions: “Cosplaying to me is an artist creating works. The biggest struggle - Are my cosplays up to standard? Can it be better? How do I make my works different and unique from others? That itself is a challenge but an exciting one. It propels me forward to constantly revisit the same characters but try out different concepts that might bring out the character better.”
“Geeks that have nothing better to do with their lives”
From the start, cosplay was not well-received by Singaporeans.
Some malicious comments cosplayers received include: “cosplaying is weird”, “it’s just some sort of fetish” and “lack of clothing”.
Mr Han mentions: “The general public in the past relates anime with, excuse my words, ‘hentai’. A lot of them see cosplayers as ‘hippies’ as they think it’s related to sleazy activity,”
“Everyone knows how much effort it takes to do what you’re passionate about. Yet people still easily assume that cosplay is just a fetish which is very degrading to me,” Maoru (not her real name), another renowned 21-year-old cosplayer in Singapore, added.
More than meets the eye
However, cosplaying is beyond those misconceptions. A cosplayer is a mix and breed of different artists combined together: make-up, costume-making, photography, modelling and the list goes on.
“Cosplay is not just an art but multiple forms of art. There’s the art of costume-making, prop-making and wig-styling to make sure that it resembles the character. There is make-up, which is one of the most important skills as it makes or breaks the character, as well as, posing which captures the essence of the characters in pictures,” Mr Han remarked.
Maoru confidently poses for the camera, cosplaying as the character called ‘Kaneki’ in the Tokyo Ghoul franchise to promote UNIQLO’s new line of Manga UT.
(Photo: Geist Productions)
Just like art, cosplaying also gives people a platform to express themselves, gathering together as a community to embrace the one thing they have in common with each other. Cosplayers also bring joy to Anime fans as they breathe life into their favourite fictional characters.
Maoru, a 21-year-old student, is a cosplay talent managed by Geist, under the same agency as Yosuke.
She mentions: “I was astonished because making friends in the cosplay community is not that hard. We share the love for one character and from there we suddenly became friends even though we were just strangers.”
In 2019, Singapore Police Force (SPF) reached out to cosplayers Yosuke and Maoru, to participate in a talk show at EOY J-culture Festival for an anti-scam awareness roadshow, particularly e-commerce scams.
(Photo: Geist Productions)
Maoru added that: “Everyone cosplaying looked so happy which made me want to try it out and cosplaying has become a great part of our daily lives, it helps us feel better. I learnt how to talk more, improved on my presentation skills and expressed myself more which is one of my weaknesses.”
What could this mean for Singapore’s art scene in the future?
As the future of Singapore’s arts scene lies in the hands of the younger generation, we asked a student involved in an art interest group from Republic Polytechnic (RP) to share his thoughts about Singapore’s arts scene and cosplaying.
A 19-year-old member named Muhammad Adam Bin Tukiran from Style Groovaz Crew, a hip-hop dance interest group from RP, gave us his insights.
When asked what he thinks of cosplay as a form of art in Singapore, he mentions: Dancing is a form of art because it is an artistic expression through our movements which can be a form of communication and feelings too. I think that cosplaying is also a form of expression that involves efforts, technicalities, skills and creativity, this is definitely an art. Perhaps, representing a character and performing a character’s actions in front of the audience together with the finished look could be considered a performing art, just like dance.”
With new forms of the arts coming into light, Singapore’s art scene may not be so stagnant after all. It could progress and become even more colourful and vibrant.
“As a dancer, I believe that cosplayers can also be part of the arts scene in Singapore in the future, as long as there is a dedicated team who spreads awareness, while slowly building up interests in the society and growing the size of the cosplay community. I do believe it is very possible with the right team, efforts and mindset,” Adam added.
Hopefully, a few years from now, Singaporeans would be more aware of the cosplay community as a form of artistic expression and give the younger generation more options to express themselves and perform, other than through music, dance or drawing.
So, should Cosplay be considered as an art in Singapore?
You decide.
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