Takahiro Yamazaki (山崎 隆広, born October 11, 1976, in Shizuoka City) is a former Japanese professional baseball…Takahiro Yamazaki (山崎 隆広, born October 11, 1976, in Shizuoka City) is a former Japanese professional baseball outfielder for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball. He played from 2006 to 2009. His younger brother Tetsuya is a former Japanese footballer.
Toshinobu "Toshi" Kubota (久保田 利伸, Kubota Toshinobu; born 24 July 1962) is a Japanese singer, songwriter, musician…Toshinobu "Toshi" Kubota (久保田 利伸, Kubota Toshinobu; born 24 July 1962) is a Japanese singer, songwriter, musician, music producer, and radio personality. He has produced six million-seller records and thirty-three Top 40 singles during his career. Kubota is currently part of Sony Music Japan. In addition, he has composed and written songs for many singers including Hiromi Iwasaki, Misia, Toshinori Yonekura, Kyōko Koizumi, and many other recording artists. Kubota's musical genre has varied throughout his career including R&B, Go-go, soul, funk, blues, reggae, old skool, psychedelia, jazz, and pop. His artistic influences include Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway, and Sly Stone. Kubota has pioneered in the sound "Japanese hip hop" and "Japanese soul", an amalgam of funk, pop, R&B and go that has influenced many other musicians. Kubota has a tenor and falsetto vocal range and is known for his signature songs "Dance If You Want It", "Missing", "Love Rain (Koi no Ame)", "You Were Mine", "Give You My Love", and "La La La Love Song", which was the theme song of the television drama Long Vacation. Kubota has a total of seventeen studio albums and ten compilation albums. He is among the all-time best-selling Japanese music artists, having sold over 16 million records worldwide to date.
Daijiro Oishi (大石 大二郎, Ōishi Daijirō; born October 20, 1958) is a professional Japanese baseball player. He was an…Daijiro Oishi (大石 大二郎, Ōishi Daijirō; born October 20, 1958) is a professional Japanese baseball player. He was an infielder for the Kintetsu Buffaloes for 16 seasons. He served as a coach for the Buffaloes from 2003 to 2008 before managing the Orix Buffaloes in 2008, managing two seasons.
Hisao Niura, also known as Kim Il-young (Korean: 김일융; born May 11, 1951), is a Japanese former professional baseball…Hisao Niura, also known as Kim Il-young (Korean: 김일융; born May 11, 1951), is a Japanese former professional baseball pitcher who played Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan and KBO League baseball in South Korea. Over a 22-season career, he was a five-time champion, four times with the Yomiuri Giants and once with the Samsung Lions. He was a two-time ERA champion of Japan's Central League. A workhorse during much of his career, he had success as both a starter and a reliever. Although born in Japan, Niura is of Korean descent, part of the Zainichi community.
Toshiharu Ai (阿井利治, Ai Toshiharu; born June 6, 1935 in Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan) is a former Japanese Nippon…Toshiharu Ai (阿井利治, Ai Toshiharu; born June 6, 1935 in Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan) is a former Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball catcher. He played for the Kokutetsu Swallows from 1954 to 1960.
Tamiji Kitagawa (北川 民次, Kitagawa Tamiji; January 27, 1894 – April 26, 1989) was a Japanese painter, printmaker and art…Tamiji Kitagawa (北川 民次, Kitagawa Tamiji; January 27, 1894 – April 26, 1989) was a Japanese painter, printmaker and art educator. Kitagawa's work, ranging in media from oil and tempera paintings to woodcuts and copperplate prints, to mosaic and ceramic murals, depict not only everyday-life scenes of urban and rural working people, but also political events. He synthesized traditions of postimpressionist, expressionist, Cubist and Surrealist painting with Mexican modernist painting, particularly Mexican muralism, and such Japanese artistic traditions as Nihonga, ink wash painting, and ceramics. Having encountered such socially aware artists as the US-American realist painter John Sloan and the Mexican modernist painter Alfredo Ramos Martínez during his years in the United States and Mexico from 1914 to 1936, Kitagawa became involved in Ramos Martínez’ Open Air Art Schools of Painting, which, as part of the Mexican postrevolutionary social reforms, provided children and adolescents in rural areas with access to art to foster their emancipation. After returning to Japan in 1936, Kitagawa was accepted by the Japanese art world for his unique painting style inspired by Mexican muralism. He became a member of the Nika Art Association and began engaging in art education as a jury member of children's art exhibitions and as a publisher of children's books in collaboration with art critic Sadajirō Kubo. Kitagawa became a seminal figure for the progressive art education movement in Japan in the postwar years. Inspired by the Mexican Open Air Art Schools, he organized an open-air summer art school for children and adolescents at the Higashiyama Zoo in Nagoya, founded his own art school, and was involved in the Sōzō Biiku Kyōkai (Society for Creative Art Education), a network of artists, teachers, and parents advocating for a child- and life-centered approach in art education. With his cross-cultural experiences and knowledge of social, racial and cultural representations of painting, his compassion for disadvantaged social and cultural minorities, and his lifelong social commitment to art and art education as essential for the advancement of a democratic society, Kitagawa was a key figure in establishing a new understanding of art as an essential part of human development in Japan.
