Tatsuki Fujimoto is a connoisseur of what you might call “dirtbag compassion.” Though his works explore complex and difficult topics with elevated nuance, his perspective always hangs near the muck – dicks getting kicked, toilet jokes, unrepentant, gleeful acts of deviance and perversion. There’s an honesty in that; rather than maintaining the soapy, reverent tone often employed for difficult topics, he talks about grief and hunger and oppression in the way they are experienced, in the context of our messy lives and allegedly “incorrect” emotional responses. His work is essentially the opposite of a Very Special Episode, wherein the harsh aspects of life are framed in slow motion and soft lighting, accompanied by a pensive indie rock ballad. Life is rarely so tonally accommodating – and as imperfect, ever-struggling human beings, our reactions to life’s troubles are rarely the ones you see on television.

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