Street Fighter’s Chun Li gets a new statue in Nara, Japan – here’s why

On March 9, a new statue of Chun Li from Street Fighter was unveiled in Nara prefecture, Japan. As reported by Nara Shimbun, the bronze statue is part of a collaboration between Street Fighter developer Capcom and Nara prefecture’s Kashihara City. 

Standing at around 1.5 meters including its base, the statue can be found in front of the branch office of Kashihara City Hall. Kashihara is the birthplace of Capcom’s founder Kenzo Tsujimoto. Since August 2022, Capcom and Kashihara City have entered into an agreement that allows the city to use Street Fighter characters to help bring people to the city and revitalize it.  

Street Fighter has been connected to Kashihara even before the recent collaboration. In 1995, an educational anime movie featuring characters from the game series was released. Street Fighter II: Return to the Fujiwara Capital features Japan’s first integrated capital city, Fujiwara-kyo, that was founded 1300 years ago in what is now Kashihara City. 

The new Chun Li statue was crowdfunded, achieving just over its 5,550,000-yen (approx. 37,680 USD) goal thanks to donations from 34 people. Prior to the unveiling of the statue, a martial arts demonstration was held by the local high school club, and attendees could also enjoy playing a few rounds of Street Fighter.  

Wandering around the city, you may also stumble across a bronze statue of Ryu that was unveiled last year, or three colorful manhole covers featuring Ryu, Chun Li and the 1995 educational anime movie. Looking at Kashihara City’s website, it seems that they plan to do more events and add more characters to their Street Fighter statue roster in the future (namely Ken and E. Honda). 

Street Fighter 6 is currently available for PC (Steam), PS4/PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. 

For more Street Fighter-related articles, check out Street Fighter 6 menu shows Ryu’s third nipple apparently or Street Fighter II gets new character in official browser game collab with Pocky.