Comic strips

Tak Toyoshima’s Secret Asian Man graces AsianWeek Magazine cover

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Alan Gardner April 1, 2008 1 minute 4 comments

Tak Toyoshima’s Secret Asian Man is on this week’s front cover of AsianWeek Magazine. This issue explores Asian American comic artists and their work in gaining recognition and portrayals of the Asian American experience. Other artists featured include Asian Americana by Ian Liu and Droodles by Alex Yu.

Regarding Tak, they write:

Secret Asian Man has appeared in AsianWeek since 2002, and since July 2007, the mouthless, bushy-eyebrowed Asian American cartoon has been syndicated in daily newspapers nationwide, challenging stereotypes and provoking thoughts about race while making readers laugh. The series is based on Toyoshima’s life and regularly deals with Asian American issues in a hip, refined manga style.

Before it became syndicated and read by a mainstream audience, the strip dealt mainly with Asian American issues. Early strips were angrier in tone, but as time went on and Toyoshima matured as an artist, the tone lightened. He raised questions in his strips for readers to ponder rather than merely venting. But he’s not afraid to still tackle heavy subjects like Vincent Chin, the Chinese American who was beaten to death in 1982 by two white autoworkers who believed they had lost their jobs to the Japanese.