- Department
- Department of Character Design
- Position
- Associate Professor
- Specialization
- Understanding and Reconstructing Visual Creative Structures: Comprehensive education in the fundamentals, applications, and theoretical foundations of drawing and artwork, including observational drawing, human anatomy, composition, color theory, lighting and shadow, and visual guidance of the viewer’s gaze. Art Practices in Entertainment Contexts: Instruction in character design and visual development across entertainment domains such as games, animation, illustration, and visual effects (VFX), with a particular focus on art practices contextualized within contemporary entertainment industries, including visual construction for virtual performers such as V-Livers and related media personas. Pre-production Work: Support for concept art development, narrative construction, project planning, and production management across manga, illustration, animation, and VFX domains, as well as strategic guidance for branding and expressive positioning of creators and performers, including illustrators, artists, character designers (e.g., VTuber “mamas”), and idols.
- Degrees Earned
- Bachelor of Fine Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts
Master’s Degree in Visual and Performing Arts (Painting), Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze
Ph.D. in Knowledge Science, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST),
Completed Ahead of Standard Term
- Affiliated Academic
Arganizations
- IEEE（Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers）
ACM（Association for Computing Machinery）
- Profile
- Harutaka Matsunaga graduated from the Department of Oil Painting, Faculty of Fine Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts in March 1998. He completed his apprenticeship at the Studio Passeri, an Italian painting restoration workshop, in June 2004. In July 2009, he received his Master’s degree in Painting and Multimedia Imaging from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze, where he resided in Italy for ten years.
In June 2025, he completed a Ph.D. in Knowledge Science at the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST), graduating ahead of the standard term from the Graduate School of Advanced Science and Technology, Department of Advanced Science and Technology.
His peer-reviewed journal article, co-authored with Kazunori Miyata, was published in IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications in 2024:
Matsunaga, H., & Miyata, K. (2024). “A Study on Sustainable Collaboration between CG Production Studios and Educational Institutions.” IEEE CG&A, 8 pages.
He has presented multiple peer-reviewed papers as first author at the SIGGRAPH and SIGGRAPH Asia Educators Forum between 2023 and 2024. In addition to academic activities, he has held numerous solo and group exhibitions of his paintings. He is the founder and director of ArteVivo.
- Message
- I have stood at the intersection of art and technology, continually exploring the possibilities of expression. Through international experiences and academic research, I have come to realize that creativity is, above all, the power to keep asking questions.
In this rapidly changing era, trust in your own sensibility and learning, and move forward step by step. Do not fear failure—embrace challenges with flexibility. That mindset will open the doors to your future.
