YURIA MATSUSHITA

JOINT DIRECTOR OF TORANOKO PERFORMING ARTS COMPANY

Film Director, Stage Director, Scriptwriter, Art Director

 

YURIA MATSUSHITA  is now recognized as one of the world’s finest up and coming young film directors. Born in Ehime, Japan in 1977, her travels to study a variety of different art forms in many parts of the world have given her a global perspective which is readily apparent in her work. Yuria’s father Bunji is Japanese and has been recognized as one of Japan’s earliest and most important advocates of international understanding. Yuria’s mother Elzbieta is Polish from a family of artists, architects and stage actors. 

Yuria learned classical ballet from the age of four. As a young adult she graduated from the London College of Fashion in 1998, specializing in makeup and hair for performing arts, then in 1999 she studied sculpture at the Academy of Fine Art in Poznan, Poland before moving in 2000 to Thailand, where she studied classical art and began to compose poetry and scripts for film and stage performances. In 2001 her independent film “TUTU” was nominated for the PIA Film Festival. 

In 2002 Yuria moved her base back to her hometown in Japan where she was joined by her sister Erika, a well credentialed choreographer and costume designer, to establish the TORANOKO Performing Arts Company. TORANOKO specializes in a specific form of visual art combining a broad spectrum of theatrical art with various exhibitions and children playing the main parts. The children of TORANOKO have a motto - “The World is Our Stage”. In 2008 Yuria directed “Canna Lily” for the Hitachi Maxell Hi-Vision Theatre. She then directed performances of “Zanmu” which were set in a tropical garden and began in Kielce, Poland in 2009 to celebrate the thousandth year of the town’s foundation, and which ran for nine years. In that same year 2009, Yuria was awarded her Master’s Degree from Wasada University’s Global Information and Telecommunications School, specializing in digital cinematography. 

In 2011 Yuria started a stage production based on Shuji Terayama’s book of poetry for girls. Under the directorship of Yuria and her sister Erika, the TORANOKO company performed Terayama’s “I Want to Dance But I Can’t Dance” in Tokyo. In 2013 TORANOKO performed Terayama’s “Stolen Memories” in the Poznan Opera House in Poland during Japan Week. 

In 2015, in collaboration with famous animation film director Koji Yamamura, Yuria began a stage production of Yamamura’s most acclaimed film “Muybridge’s Strings” during the International Festival in Przemysl, Poland. 

In 2017, under Yuria’s directorship, TORANOKO performed “Muybridge’s Strings and Rhythm of Motion” at BankART NYK in Yokohama, Japan and was officially invited to perform at the Etiuda & Anima Film Festival in Krakow, then in Teatr Muzyczny, Poznan and Dom Sztuki Wiolinowa in Warsaw.

In 2019 Yuria directed in film, Shuji Terayama’s “A Story Sewn and Bound with a Red Thread” for which she scripted and art-directed the production, with her sister Erika as the producer and costume designer. This film has been publicly acclaimed and so far has won no less than ten awards in film festivals around the world. These include the Special Jury Award at the International Professional Feature Film Competition at the 12th NNW International Film Festival.

In 2020 Yuria directed the musical video “Hide & Seek” made for the online screening of the Chopin Village Festival in Tobe, Japan, which won four awards.

In 2022, under Yuria’s directorship, TORANOKO performed “Schoolgirl” which is based on the novel by Osamu Dazai.

Her international achievements continued in 2022, with the Japanese promotional film "33 Thirty three" screened at the Japan Pavilion during the 75th Cannes Film Festival. In 2024, Yuria and her sister Erika, as the "Yuria & Erika Sisters", received the prestigious Aesthetica Art Prize 2024 in the UK. The duo was praised as “remarkable artists reflecting on the world on both individual and universal levels.”

In 2024 Yuria directed in short film, Osamu Dazai’s “MEAN ANGEL” for which she scripted and art-directed the production, with her sister Erika as the producer and costume designer.

In 2025 Yuria released “MEAN ANGEL” , a collaborative music album with Magdalena Constance Zuk, world-renowned pianist, who is the film’s music director. 

Yuria is constantly exploring ways to share her unique artistic sensibility with the world.

 

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Erika Matsushita

Joint Director of TORANOKO Performing Arts Company

Costume Designer, Producer, Vocalist

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Erika Matsushita is a costume designer, producer, and vocalist whose imaginative work has touched audiences across the globe. Born in 1980 in Ehime, Japan to a culturally rich family—her father, Bunji, a pioneer of international cultural exchange in Japan, and her mother, Elżbieta, a Polish artist from a family of architects and actors—Erika was immersed in creativity and global thinking from an early age.

Her journey into the arts began with classical ballet at the age of three. By her teenage years, Erika had moved to the UK to attend Elmhurst Ballet School, where she focused on oil painting and performing arts, graduating in 1998. The following year, she continued her visual training under Australian painter Archie Graham, while simultaneously completing a screen acting course for film and television on the Gold Coast.

In 1999, Erika relocated to Thailand to pursue costume design at Kalawin International Institute, where she graduated in 2002. She deepened her historical understanding of fashion the following year at the London College of Fashion, specializing in costume history.

In 2004, Erika returned to her hometown in Japan to co-found the TORANOKO Performing Arts Company with her sister Yuria and a small team of artists. TORANOKO quickly gained recognition for its genre-defying approach: theatrical performances combining visual art, storytelling, and a cast of children, guided by the motto, “The World is Our Stage.”

Erika’s distinctive costume design style was showcased in the 2008 film Canna Lily, produced for Hitachi Maxell’s Hi-Vision Theatre. The following year, she designed for Zanmu, a visually stunning outdoor production set in a tropical garden, first performed in Kielce, Poland in celebration of the city’s 1,000-year anniversary. The production continued for nearly a decade.

Her academic path culminated in 2012 when she earned a master’s degree in digital cinematography from Waseda University’s Global Information and Telecommunications School, further expanding her creative reach.

From 2011 onward, Erika and Yuria brought the haunting poetry of Shuji Terayama to life through a series of stage adaptations, including I Want to Dance But I Can’t Dance (Tokyo, 2011) and Stolen Memories, performed at the Poznań Opera House in Poland during Japan Week in 2013.

In 2015, Erika began collaborating with acclaimed animation director Koji Yamamura on a stage adaptation of Muybridge’s Strings. This project evolved into the full-length production Muybridge’s Strings and Rhythm of Motion, which was performed at BankART NYK in Yokohama and invited to major venues and festivals in Poland, including the Etiuda & Anima Film Festival in Kraków and stages in Poznań and Warsaw.

In 2019, Erika produced and art-directed the short film A Story Sewn and Bound with a Red Thread, a reinterpretation of Terayama’s work. The film received widespread acclaim, winning twelve international awards including the Special Jury Award at the 12th NNW International Film Festival.

Her creative output continued with the award-winning music video Hide & Seek for the 2020 Chopin Village Festival, and the 2022 stage production of Schoolgirl, adapted from Osamu Dazai’s novel.

In the same year, Erika’s costume work was featured in 33 Thirty Three, a short promotional film screened at the Japan Pavilion during the 75th Cannes Film Festival.

In 2024, Erika and Yuria—working as the "Yuria & Erika Sisters"—were honored with the Aesthetica Art Prize in the UK, recognized for their ability to “reflect on the world on both individual and universal levels.”

That same year, Erika produced and art-directed MEAN ANGEL, a short film based on another of Dazai’s works, continuing her signature fusion of literature, costume, and cinematic form.

Through every project, Erika brings an unmatched sensitivity to texture, color, and movement—crafting costumes not just as garments, but as emotional landscapes. With more than 55 countries behind her and a world of stories still ahead, Erika Matsushita remains a force in global performing arts—visionary, rooted, and ever in motion.