The exhibition will feature illustrations of original characters designed by students in the workshops held in June and July. Their assigned theme was the pantheon of innumerable deities, a topic also explored in Tonko House’s ONI: Thunder God’s Tale. Workshop participants of junior high and high school ages also drew illustrated stories featuring their original characters. The exhibition will display these many brilliant and highly imaginative works, each befitting their creator’s age, along with photos taken during their production in the workshops.

The exhibition will include a special area dedicated to works created during Tonko House’s first 10 years. On display will be sketches, models and other forms of concept art as well as full-size prints of its characters. Tonko House’s animated productions will also be shown. Notification of the animation titles and screening schedule will be provided online, over social media, and directly at BUG.

Another special area will be set aside where visitors can experience the fun of producing artworks in a relaxed atmosphere. Participants will be free to take their creations home with them.

Tonko House is an animation studio established in Berkeley, California in July 2014 by Daisuke “Dice” Tsutsumi and Robert Kondo, who before that were art directors at Pixar Animation Studios. They decided to go on their own as joint directors of the short film The Dam Keeper, their debut work. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 2015, won a total of 25 awards worldwide, and was shown at 75 film festivals. Moom, their follow-up short animation created in 2016, received numerous awards at film festivals in eight countries. In 2017, Tonko House’s first short-form series, Pig: The Dam Keeper Poems, which was directed by Erick Oh, was initially distributed in Japan through Hulu Japan; it was later broadcast on NHK and gained widespread popularity. In 2023, Tonko House’s ONI: Thunder God’s Tale, currently available on Netflix, garnered Annie Awards – regarded as the Oscars of the animation world – in two categories as well as three Emmy Awards, the highest accolade in the U.S. television industry.

Since 2019, in addition to its base in California, Tonko House has also operated out of a studio located in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture. Besides its creative production work, Tonko House also carries out a multifaceted array of activities involving exhibitions, events, workshops, etc.