Manga @ The British Museum
Ten Second Review: This celebration of the Japanese graphic art of Manga is a beautiful and well put together exhibition. Of you’re interested in Japanese culture, eastern art or pop culture more widely, it’s an absolute must.
When I was a little kid, I used to watch Dragon Ball Z devoutly. To make sure I didn’t spend all my time in front of the TV, my mum was always trying to find books that I would actually want to read. When she found out that Dragon Ball Z was actually based on a manga she bought me a copy of the original dragon ball manga. I was delighted, but mostly because I thought that it was a prequel that they’d written for the show. Over the years she has picked up lots of different manga for me as she saw things that she thought I’d enjoy. When I was struggling to understand Shakespeare she managed to find a whole series of books that used a manga art style to retell the bard’s work in graphic novels. When I fell in love with the novel Frankenstein she managed to find a manga that used the story as a base. In tandem we have both fallen in love with the artistic styles that manga presets and when The British Museum announced a manga exhibit, both me and my mum were brimming.
The exhibition begins with an in depth look at the history of the art form. Rooting in the bold graphic styles of Japanese and eastern art, manga is inherently a storytelling art and it uses its form to this effect. This first part of the exhibit really works to trace this history of visual storytelling in eastern art and the development of manga out of this tradition. It highlights the motion that artists are able to get to out of a single frame or panel and beautifully sets up the rest of the exhbit.
The museum then goes on to look at famous examples of manga, both those that have broken through into pop culture and those that haven’t. It is always exciting to find out about things that are absolutely giant in other countries that we have no knowledge of. Whole characters and universes that have shaped a culture and yet never manage to leave their borders. It takes you on a journey of the past 70 years of manga in pop culture bringing you all the way up to the present day. This section was incredibly fun but also much more interesting than it first appeared. Managing to look at the way manga has managed to bridge entertainment, informative and political spheres immediately breaks this illusion that some western cultures have of seeing a comic strip and believing it to be for children. It also brings neatly to the third section exploring where manga is today. Before that though, there is a small but in depth library where you can sit and read some of the books featured in the exhibit. It was a hive of activity, with all ages sitting around and directly getting to grips with the art form. It is such a good idea and a brilliant interactive addition to the whole experience.
The third and final section mostly takes a step back from the art itself and looks at the variety of themes that manga has and does address. This was simultaneously the most interesting and frustrating section for me personally. It was beautifully put together and really managed really did well to bring a diverse range of manga to the forefront. What it did not address was some of the less PG13 aspects. It’s great to make sure that younger viewers can fully experience the exhibition without being tethered to their parents but it would have benefited from maybe a curtained room looking at that side of the art form and maybe taking time to address the sexualisation of things like schoolgirls. It doesn’t distract from the information that they did provide but might have made for an interesting, and arguably important, way to look at a different and undeniably key part of the art forms development and history.
Overall it was a beautifully put together exhibit that really told the story of an art form. Too often museums feel stuffy and uninviting, with children being dragged round by their parents at an exhibit that hasn’t been designed for them. It was amazing to see people of all ages genuinely engaged and while the subject might help, there is a lot to be said for the curation of the work too. A definite must see that the whole family can enjoy.
The exhibition is on at The British Museum and runs until the 26th of August 2019!
