I interviewed the painter-turned-cartoonist some years ago, and he explained his entry into the medium thusly: 'Consecutive scenes of cartoons allowed me to put more frequency and detailed 'information' and 'time' in cartoons than one painting.' Yokoyama's work has as much to do with cubism as it does with conventional comics, endeavoring to plane pregnant moments apart and display them in wafer-thin slices, using sequenced imagery to examine space and motion and processes of change. In many ways, Plaza is a return to first principles for Yokoyama. It's also the hardest to buy - no American edition, no importer, and almost sold out in Japan - but I bought one, so I'm gonna talk about it anyway. Yokoyama is many things, but accessible has never been one of them, and this is his least accessible book. It's a book that challenges you to read it all through in one go, one whose every new panel throws another hard left jab out at your eye and dares you to assimilate its information into the story you've been reading.

Even given that distinction though, Plaza sits in rarefied air. For my money, the enigmatic mangaka is the contemporary cartoonist whose work carries the highest sum total of uniqueness and quality - the guy out there right now who there's the least amount of stuff as weird as, and the least amount of stuff as good as. This might not be the best Yuichi Yokoyama comic, but it's definitely the most Yuichi Yokoyama comic.

Garden by yuichi yokoyama