Origins/
The term Thomasson comes from the professional baseball player Gary Thomasson, who was signed by the Yomiuri Giants for a record-breaking sum of money, and spent his final two seasons with the team (1981-1982) coming close to setting the league strikeout record before being benched. Akasegawa viewed Thomasson's useless position on the team as a fitting analogy for "an object, part of a building, that was maintained in good condition, but with no purpose, to the point of becoming a work of art." In Japanese there is no differentiation between singular and plural versions of the noun Tomason, therefore in English too, Thomasson can refer to one or many of these objects. In English, the term is sometimes spelled Tomason, or Thomason.
The Thomasson boom after the publication of articles in Shashin Jidai had a big effect on students and young people interested in arts and the avant-garde. The word Thomasson even spread to people who did not understand what it referred to, in a kind of social phenomenon. The cover of Chōgeijutsu Tomason featured a lost neighborhood of Minato-ku in Tokyo, Tani-cho, which vanished due to land redevelopment. Whilst not directly related to Thomasson, the story of Tani embodied its spirit. Its use on the cover of the book had a large effect on the "Thomasson Boom." This case also showed the effects of the bubble economy on the city landscape. As historian Jordan Sand notes, cataloguing Thomasson was "a way of regaining some sense of the human imprint on the city in an era when that imprint was being rapidly erased."
In 1983 the Thomasson Observation Center held an exhibition entitled "Cityscape in Anguish" at Gallery 612 in Shinjuku, displaying Akasegawa's paintings and photographs of Thomasson by Akasegawa, his students, and those sent in by readers of the magazine. Various tie-in events such as Thomasson bus tours, lectures by Akasegawa, as well as coverage on the Japanese national broadcaster NHK, and the publication, in 1987 of the complete "Chōgeijutsu Tomason," were the peak of the Thomasson Boom.
Around the same time, other artists and intellectuals were pursuing similar projects. Terunobu Fujimori's work on Architecture Detectives, Hayashi Jōji's work cataloguing manhole covers, Minami Shinbo's collections of paper stickers, Ichigi Tsutomu's work on architectural fragments and other such collections, led to Chikuma Shobō publishing a book entitled Rojō kansatsugaku nyūmon, or "Manual on Street Observation" in 1986. Alongside this, a Street Observation Society event was held to promote their work, along with a press conference.
Although Street Observation did appear to be something of a boom, it was not the same type of movement that had surrounded the activities of Akasegawa, his students, and their magazine articles. After the arrival of the Street Observation Society, Thomasson disappeared from the public eye for a while, due in part to the fact that the Thomasson Observation Center, run by Akasegawa and his students, overwhelmed by press and public attention, stopped its activities soon after the boom reached its peak. In the years immediately after the Thomasson boom, the concept was referenced in cinema and literature. In the film Patlabor: The Movie (1989) a scene featured the "Atom-bomb type" Thomasson. William Gibson's 1993 SF novel Virtual Light also makes multiple references to Thomasson.
History/
Akasegawa discovered the first Thomasson in 1972, in Yotsuya, Tokyo when he noticed a staircase that had no entranceway when one reached the top. The handlerail of the staircase, however, showed signs of repair, suggesting it was still being maintained despite the apparent uselessness of the staircase itself. The following year, Akasegawa discovered a boarded up ticket window at Ekoda station on the Seibu Ikebukuro Line. The plywood used to board up the window had been cut neatly to fit the curved stone tray of the ticket window, where it had been worn through years of use. Minami Shindō, a fellow artist and friend of Akasegawa also found a gateway at a hospital in Ochanomizu that had been completely filled up with concrete, whilst the gateway itself was still in good condition.
The artists gave these objects names such as "The pure staircase of Yotsuya," "The useless window of Ekoda" and "The useless gate of Ochanomizu" and referred to them collectively as "hyperart": their similar characteristics being "an object which, just like a piece of art, has no purpose in society, but also, just like a piece of art is preserved with care, to the point where it appears to be on display. However, these objects do not appear to have a creator, making them even more art-like than regular art." Hyperart cannot be created by an artist, but only found and recognized as such by an observer.
Those pieces of hyperart that were part of buildings or the built environment were given the name "Thomasson." The name was decided upon during a discussion between Akasegawa and his students during his class on "Modernology" (a concept created by Wajiro Kon). At that time, Gary Thomasson's strikeout record was at 132.
The concept of Thomasson was introduced to the general public in 1982, via a series of articles in the magazine Shashin Jidai (Photo Times), published by Byakuya-Shobō. The articles featured findings by Akasegawa's students from his "Modernology" class as well as photographs of those "objects" catalogued by Akasegawa himself, and those sent in by readers. The articles created a "Thomasson Boom" and the concept soon spread. The early Thomasson articles featured in Shashin Jidai were published by Byakuya-Shobō as a book entitled Chōgeijutsu Tomason. The complete series of articles was later published as a paperback by Chikuma Shobō in 1987, using the same title.
Catagories/
Some of the most popular types of Thomasson, based on the categories in Chikuma Shobō's "Thomasson Illustrated Encyclopedia"
The Useless StaircaseAlso known as a Pure Staircase. A staircase that only goes up and down. Most used to have a door at the top. Some useless staircases exist that were useless right from completion, due to changes or mix-ups in the design.
The A-bomb TypeA 2-D Thomasson. The outline of a building that remains in silhouette on a wall. This can be seen when a section of a tightly packed row of buildings is torn down. Cases that appear due to water are known as Hydrogen bombs.
The Elevated TypeThese objects are normal themselves, but exist in a higher than normal place, therefore seeming strange. For example, a door with a handle on the second floor of a wall. These often appear when staircases are torn down.
The Useless DoorwayEven though it has been blocked up, a Useless Doorway still maintains the majesty of its original purpose. In other cases, a Useless Doorway exists in a place that has no need for it, with no wall or fence around it.
The Pure TypeAn uncategorizable object whose use it is impossible to fathom. For example, the Pure Shutters, which open to reveal a blank wall, and the Pure Tunnel that exists without a surrounding hill. The Pure Staircase of Yotsuya belongs in this category.
The Useless BridgeA bridge over a filled-in river, or a bridge that has become useless. In the case of some covered drains, a bridge is still necessary for cars or heavy vehicles to cross. In this case these could not be called Useless Bridges, as they only appear useless.