Tomonari Nishikawa, the Cinema Department chair who created more than 20 experimental films during his career, passed away on April 20. Friends, family and colleagues honored his memory and legacy at two on-campus services last weekend.

Nishikawa was born in Nagoya, Japan and immigrated to the United States in 1999 to become a filmmaker. He received a Master of Fine Arts from the San Francisco Art Institute.

In 2010, he helped launch the Kuala Lumpur Experimental Film, Video and Music Festival, an “independent, artist-run grassroots international festival of experimental film, video and music” in Malaysia. Three years later, he co-founded Transient Visions: Festival of the Moving Image in Johnson City. He served as a juror for film festivals across the world.

Nishikawa was internationally recognized for his work, grabbing the top prize at the 2015 Curtocircuíto International Film Festival and the 2017 Jury Award at the Hong Kong International Film Festival.

Last Friday, students, faculty and alumni hosted “Tomonari, light of a thousand stars,” a film screening and memorial in Lecture Hall 6. The event opened with remarks from Long Pham, a senior majoring in cinema, and Suheyla Noyan, a second-year master’s student studying cinema. Pham reflected on Nishikawa’s impact on the University, starting in 2001 when he double-majored in philosophy and cinema. Noyan said Nishikawa took inspiration from Ken Jacobs, an experimental filmmaker who founded the University’s Cinema Department in 1969.

They played an hourlong screening of Nishikawa’s work, featuring many films he produced over the past 20 years, including: “Apollo,” “Into the Mass,” “Tokyo-Ebisu,” “Shibuya-Tokyo,” “45 7 Broadway,” “Manhattan One Two Three Four,” “Sound of a Million Insects, Light of a Thousand Stars,” “Ten Mornings Ten Evenings and One Horizon,” “Market Street,” “Amusement Ride” and “Light, Noise, Smoke, and Light, Noise, Smoke.”

When filming, Nishikawa often used traditional analog photography instead of digital. Many of his works documented ordinary aspects of life in a way that showed an appreciation for the medium of film. He often employed unconventional methods in his pieces, like scratching film to produce distorted visuals and combining video and live performances.

After the screening, attendees were invited to share memories and stories. One alumnus said he felt “validated as an artist” when Nishikawa helped him through an award nomination process. Another speaker said a two-week study abroad program in Japan with Nishikawa began his “foray into cinema.”

Students and faculty were also able to share memories on a “gratitude wall” outside his office in CW B09.

Professor Ariana Gerstein, the cinema department’s interim chair and graduate director, said she knew Nishikawa at every step of his career.

“I saw him all the way through, through all of his promotions — everything,” said Gerstein. “For as long as I knew him, he was always the same: an incredibly thoughtful person, a person who listened, who had a wonderful sense of humor and who was incredibly determined.”

“So he thought very carefully about things, and then he was systematic,” she continued. “He would come up with an idea, and then he was systematic. It was that way when he taught, and it was that way when he worked in service for the department.”

Noyan and Pham collected notes, photos and other physical mementos from attendees as a gift to the family.

A community memorial service was also held on Sunday in LH B-89, where family members, friends, faculty, staff and former students gathered to remember Nishikawa. Attendees were encouraged to write personal messages to him before some spoke on how Nishikawa encouraged and inspired them.

“He was very magnetic,” said Pham. “And, magnetic in a way, not super imposing on people, but in a very down-to-earth, very quiet way that drew people toward him because he was a genuinely good human being.”