The first large-scale exhibition in America dedicated to manga as an art form, 'Art of Manga,' will debut on the East Coast at the Brooklyn Museum on October 3. Featuring over 600 original drawings from legendary creators such as Junji Itō, Eiichiro Oda (One Piece), Hirohiko Araki (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure), Rumiko Takahashi (InuYasha), and Tite Kubo (Bleach), the show traces manga's evolution from foundational artists like Chiba Tetsuya and Akatsuka Fujio to contemporary voices. The exhibition also highlights themes including coming of age, LGBTQ+ rights, and environmentalism, and originally opened at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
This exhibition matters because it offers U.S. audiences a rare opportunity to view original manga drawings, which are seldom seen outside Japan. By presenting manga as a sophisticated visual art form with global cultural impact, the show challenges perceptions of the medium and underscores its power to transcend language and borders. Curators emphasize that the artwork reveals each artist's creative process and the distinctive use of line to evoke motion, emotion, and narrative, affirming manga's place in the broader art world.