Person: Kuri Youji 2r4n18

Kuri Youji was born on April 9, 1928, in Sabae City, Fukui Prefecture, Japan. He was a cartoonist and independent filmmaker. He graduated from Bunka Gakuin.

Kuri was one of if not the most important figures in the history of Japanese independent animation, he was the unofficial leader and most prolific of the Animation Sannin no Kai (アニメーション三人の会) collective whom kick-started the renaissance of modern-styled, independently made, adult-aimed animation in early 1960s Japan. He is known internationally for the very black comedy of his films, with the typically naïve style of his cartooning often belying the surreal, obscene and disturbing situations they depict (though he has worked in a variety of styles and mediums, including pixilation); this made them a favourite among the fervently counter-cultural audiences, which included such filmmakers as René Laloux, of the first few years of the Annecy International Animated Film Festival and in a 1967 publication he was considered to be "the most significant" and "the only Japanese animator whose work is known in the West" (which is to disregard the Toei Animation features and Astro Boy series that were first seen in the West around the same time that Kuri's first several films were and mentioned in ing in the same publication, though these were not known as works of an individual and characteristic filmmaker and often had their Japanese origin downplayed). After retiring from filmmaking he continued to illustrate and to teach animation at Laputa Art Animation School (アート・アニメーションのちいさな学校).