Friday at the Atelier

Friday at the Atelier is an odd but strangely charming manga by Sakura Hamada.

Office woman Emiko is tired of life. We meet her on her way home after work thinking, “I want to die… but first… I suppose I should buy groceries for dinner. Which should I do first?” Exhausted adults will relate.

She nearly stumbles over a man, collapsed on the sidewalk. She checks on him, and he asks her to model for him. He is a famous artist, “the rising star of surrealism”, and his paintings all feature naked women with fish on them.

She agrees — why not? she no longer cares what happens to her — but then, after the modeling session, he cooks up the fish and they eat them together. (Turns out he’s also a good cook.) She enjoys the meal, and her appetite gives her back an interest in life.

Emiko is drawn as a gorgeous innocent, rather Madonna-ish. Her face is often blank, with focus on her huge eyes, but that also captures the way she’s become disconnected from life. She’s lovely, so it’s understandable that an artist would seek her to model. (There’s tasteful nudity in the book, obviously.)

From the start he is insistent that he doesn’t date his models, but it also becomes obvious that he’s jealous when she spends time with others. Much of the first volume is about them negotiating their new relationship, as when they share an umbrella, and growing to know each other better. Will he use other models? How does she feel about him and her role as a model? How will his feelings towards her manifest next? How should they show their appreciation for each other?

The story is remarkably calming for me. There’s a quiet art lesson where he helps repair her shoe by matching the color, but then there are funny moments where she doesn’t realize how much he’s attracted to her. She asks him to do things that could be seen as flirting, but she’s unaware. It’s amusing.

Friday at the Atelier volume 2 highlights how much meaning comes from context. He’s not embarrassed to see her nude while they’re working, but after she showers and puts on only a towel, he finds that “indecent”, because now he’s seeing an attractive woman in a revealing wrap. Similarly, she’ll stand around nude, but after she has her wisdom tooth out, and he asks to look in her mouth, that makes her bashful.

These two are just silly, I guess. In this volume, we also see more of Hirano, the artist’s manager. He’s much more direct with Emiko, and he sees much more about them than either realizes.

The world expands as we meet Emiko’s co-worker friends, and the artist bumps into some of his old fellow students. She continues to inspire his projects, and they end up taking care of each other in small ways.

I like spending time with these characters, and I like the feeling the series gives me.