Ultra Graphic Poster “ウル寅” by Eiji Yamada

This poster was created by Eiji Yamada in 1997 to advertise a new company called Ultra Graphics. This poster features two large cartoon eyes with two star-pupils and three round pupils for each eye. This design uses two different techniques, which are printing and drawing. The bold red letters that can be seen are created with what seems like a computer graphic design. The big cartoon eyes in the middle were drawn with black markers. If you take a closer look, you can see the unevenness of the eyes and different shades of black marker. The bold red letter in the design says “ウルウル” (Uru Uru) which is an onomatopoeia for teary-eyes in Japanese. The word Uru on this poster came from Yamada’s company “Ul”tra Graphics. The word Uru has a lot of meanings in the Japanese language, such as to sell, to earn, and lacquer. For this poster, Yamada got his inspiration from a teary-eyed mask that his co-worker gave him. Yamada won the JAGDA Rookie Designer award in the year of 1998 with this poster.