Hi everyone,
We are working on the final phase of the budget/expense this week and meeting Give2Asia on Friday to discuss our final donation numbers. It is a lot of paperwork and the part not as exciting as the event itself…but is one of the most important parts of charity project like this.
Also, we are sending books little by little. Remember we can only do it during lunch time with one or two people! I know those of you who ordered are anxious to receive your copies.. please be patient. and feel free to contact admin@totoroforestproject.org for your order status.
Meanwhile, let me introduce another fun charity project I launched with my illustrator friend Gerald Guerlais 2 years ago, Sketchtravel Project!
I have to say, I felt comfortable with Totoro Forest Project idea when I first started talking to Enrico and Ronnie because of my experience with Sketchtravel. This is also a dream like project where artists from all over the world meet through one inspiration.
Each artist gets one page and can do any art work on it. The rule is that the book must be hand-delivered to the artist by one of the participating artists. There’s no re-do. There is only one book. If the book gets lost, that’s the end of it. That’s why it is so precious. IF we have all 60 pages filled without any accident, we will auction off the book for a charity cause of which the participating artists vote to choose.
This book consists of all star line up of artists just like Totoro Forest Project. Many of them were generous bunch to do both such as Enrico Casarosa, Ronnie Del Carmen,Dice Tsutsumi, Robert MacKenzie, Vincent Nguyen, Peter de Seve, Rebecca Dautremer,Lou Romano, Tadahiro Uesugi, James Jean, Yoko Tanji etc..
Some of the other big names worth mentioning are Bill Plympton, Francois Rocca, Robert Valley, Jerome Opena….
We have some exciting artists that are coming up such as Nicloas de Crecy, Carlos Nine, Enrique Fernandez, Katsuya Terada, Nicolas Uribe, and Tomer Hanuka….etc..
In 2007, a French documentary film maker Chaterine Bonvalot with her Owls Productions started following this exciting journey on film. Yes! There will be a documentary film of this project! Another exciting addition to this book.

Check out all the sketches done so far! A whole bunch of quite amazing original sketches all in one book!
-

Check out Sketchtravel Teaser Trailer!
-

Documentary Film “Sketchtravel” has started filming!
-

Some artists like Nash Dunnigan and Robert MacKenzie always find the way to goof off…..
——
This project, since its launch in 2006, inspired many artists around the world. One of them is Tim Sale’s Sketchbook Project! And they did it a lot more efficiently than us! What an achievement Tim! Congratulations!
I think there are so much fun stuff we can do with artists community around the world via internet. And the power of art can give quite an impact to the cause you believe in. Maybe it’ll make something better. I hope many of you do your own “Totoro Forest Project!!”