Meet the Japanese artist who made the world’s largest GPS drawing for his marriage proposal

However big you’re hoping to make your marriage proposal in this age of viral one-upmanship, you’re going to have a tough time topping Japan’s artist known as “Yassan.”

In 2010, Yassan (real name: Yasushi Takahashi) left behind his girlfriend for six months to wander across Japan to create an epic marriage proposal. Carrying a GPS, Yassan covered 7,163.7 km mostly by walking, but with some use of a car, ferry, and bicycle.

When he got home, he downloaded the data into Google maps, and the result was the image above this story: “Marry me.” It has since been certified by Guinness as the world’s largest GPS drawing.

Though he made the journey four years ago, his trek is now being featured in a new ad campaign and documentary by Hi-Tec, a company that makes hiking shoes and boots. Yassan’s story is the latest to be featured in “The Walkumentary Series.”

Here’s Yassan’s segment:

[vimeo 109675096 w=500 h=281]

Yassan’s Proposal – A Walkumentary on Vimeo.

While his proposal is getting attention now, Yassan has been creating these large-scale GPS drawings for several years now. You can check out his portfolio on his website.

Yassan says he quit his job in June 2008 to pursue his passion for making GPS drawings. In addition to creating art, he said his goal was to “experience Japan I only know in books.”

Here’s a longer video of Yassan’s proposal created by the artist:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAlsvQ32GPI]