Famed Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki describes the moments between action in his film as “moments of Ma” – as something much like the spaces between claps. He notes, “If you just have non-stop action with no breathing space at all, it’s just busyness. But if you take a moment, then the tension building in the film can grow into a wider dimension. If you just have constant tension at 80 degrees all the time you just get numb.” The portfolio below is from students in Mr. King’s East Asian Pop Culture senior English elective: each student chose different elements of “Ma” in films they love and redrew them (or created them from scratch!) trying to encompass that same feeling of “between-ness” and “rest.”