Realities Merge at the ‘Art of Manga’ Exhibit in San Francisco
On its opening day, San Francisco’s de Young Museum welcomed patrons to the first large-scale manga exhibit in North America. “Art of Manga” is a visual buffet for experts and newcomers alike, immersing visitors into the same plane as the very panels they see before their eyes. Fans and those curious can take a closer look at original works from the exhibit’s ten featured manga artists: Tetsuya Chiba, Fujio Akatsuka, Rumiko Takahashi, Jiro Taniguchi, Mari Yamazaki, Hirohiko Araki, Kazumi Yamashita, Gengoroh Tagame, Fumi Yoshinaga, and Eiichiro Oda. In addition, select works from Ito Junji, Agi Tadashi, and Tite Kubo are interspersed between the 600 original artworks in the main gallery as part of the exhibit’s exploration of different manga genres.
“’Art of Manga’ presents the power of Japanese contemporary art in a medium that is fast becoming a phenomenon, especially among younger generations around the world,” said Tom Campbell, the director and CEO of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Campbell reached out to Nicole Coolidge Rousmaniere, the exhibit’s curator and Japanese art scholar, after he saw the British Museum’s “The Citi Exhibition: Manga” in 2019. As a fine arts museum, the de Young hosts collections from internationally renowned painters and sculptors, and crafting a manga exhibit challenged the museum to step out of its comfort zone.
“They’ve never delved so deeply with publishers, the artists in Japan, and Japanese protocols,” said exhibit curator Rousmaniere to Anime News Network. “Japanese publishers are also not accustomed to hosting multiple publisher exhibitions abroad, and it presented a learning curve for them. They were worried whether the conditions would be appropriate for the genga.”
Displaying works from multiple artists is a challenge and a risk for all parties involved, akin to moving mountains to bring together works from prominent publishers such as Hakusensha, Futabasha, Kadokawa, Kodansha, Shinchosha, Shogakukan, and Shueisha.
“Art museums, in general, feel that it’s a real privilege to host a living artist’s work. However, publishers aren’t really interested in that; they’re interested in publishing the work of the manga artist. They don’t mind it being displayed, but that’s not their main work. Hopefully, they’ll be pleased when they come to see it and see their artists shine,” Rousmaniere said.
Indeed, the representatives from the publishers would be happy to see the crowded halls as guests exchanged excited expressions and posed in front of the JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure wall panels. To encourage continued interest and participation, the museum hosts Cosplay Days on select Saturdays throughout the exhibit’s run. Many eagerly explained featured manga panels to their friends or relatives, commenting on the impressive linework and visible ink strokes.
Similar to analyzing an oil painting, the analogue manga panels and genga allow viewers to see editor notes, blue-lined sketches, and explore the artistry behind the line strokes that make up the finished product. Rousmaniere points to the final panel of Ashita no Joe, one of the most famous images in Japan, and calls out the fine details of the original page. “Chiba-sensei said that he was embarrassed to have all this white out and the paper tears.” The work also beckons the viewers’ interpretation of Joe’s gentle smile while slumped in his chair: “Is he dead or is he alive?” To this day, readers still passionately discuss their perspective on the matter as fervently as the topic of Mona Lisa’s smile.
Whether visitors are long-time fans or exploring manga as an art form for the first time, the exhibit provides a new experience with every visit. “Art of Manga” puts manga artists center stage, while also teaching visitors how to read manga and the order to follow through the passages of each gallery. Indeed, the exhibit’s impressive design takes great pains to tell its own story about the importance of the medium and emphasizes the artists at every step. In manga, black frames and panels signal the past or a flashback, which is why the first room is decorated in black, adhering to the same guidelines that manga authors typically follow. The featured artists are listed in order of seniority, starting with Tetsuya Chiba and Fujio Akatsuka, and ending with Eiichiro Oda.
Taking inspiration from the works on display, the designers crafted “portals” for visitors to traverse from one area to another. Alejandro Stein, a designer for “Art of Manga,” told ANN about what considerations and aspects they explored to bring the gallery to life.
“The most exciting one for us was designing the introductory portal, and that idea came from [Rumiko Takahashi‘s] MAO, where the main character is in a shopping mall and goes through a portal and is transported through time and space to this village in the past.” Each portal transition is purposefully done by layering, where it shifts forms to mirror the transformation between the artist’s worlds, such as the change from Gengoroh Tagame‘s mask to Fumi Yoshinaga‘s Mizuno Yunoshin.
“We worked on the projections, the moving graphics, to create a more immersive and engaging moment, highlighting something specific from the pages.” For Mari Yamazaki‘s gallery, they referenced the architecture in Thermae Romae, and included her drawing of a Roman-like sculpture of Osamu Tezuka. They explored other ideas, but were unable to bring them to fruition. To poke fun at the environment, they considered changing the speech bubble for Dio’s famous “MUDA MUDA MUDA” to “EMERGENCY EMERGENCY EMERGENCY” because the wall decoration sits above the emergency exit sign. Unfortunately, the design change wasn’t approved, so the manga panel remained unchanged.
“What’s interesting about the exhibition is not what we [the manga authors] think about manga, but what people in the United States think about it,” said Mari Yamazaki, when asked about her thoughts on the exhibit in an interview with Anime News Network. “In the U.S., people think about comics as cartoons, like in Marvel Comics and graphic novels. I hope by seeing my work and other authors’ works here that they will realize manga is a much broader form of expression.”
Currently, Yamazaki is working on Thermae Romae Redux, and came to discuss her work at the de Young Museum. By sharing her expertise and experience as an author, Yamazaki hopes to continue expanding people’s perception of manga’s influence as a global phenomenon.
One last area to bring home the importance of manga is the “ONE PIECE ONLY” room, which features color proofs and printing plates used in the book production process. More impressively, the installation features ONE PIECE chapters from 1 to 1110, which were cut and mounted on the gallery walls. Masashi “Kinpachi” Okamoto, the director of the Shueisha Manga-Art Heritage project, wanted to show the world how manga is created, drawing on his background in Shueisha‘s production department.
“These printing plates are abandoned or recycled day by day,” explained Kinpachi to ANN. He clarified that the factories themselves own the plates, and not the publishers or the authors. “Many of these plates don’t exist now, but we should archive them for the future. If you want to study how manga is made, there’s no real place to do so anymore.”
Overall, the “Art of Manga” exhibit provides an in-depth examination of Japanese manga, placing manga artists at the forefront. The de Young Museum rolled out the red carpet for guests–new and longtime visitors–to step into the world of Japanese contemporary art. Several manga artists, such as Gengoroh Tagame, are set to give talks at the museum later in the fall and winter. For those who want to revisit the museum without breaking the bank, the Art of Manga Fan Pass grants the holder unlimited entries for a patron and one guest into the museum until Jan 25, 2026.
Meanwhile, in San Francisco’s Dogpatch district, the Minnesota Street Project is currently hosting two exhibitions in partnership with Shueisha Manga-Art Heritage. The gallery features the world premiere of new lithographs and lenticular pieces from Hirohiko Araki’s JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure and brings Keiichi Tanaami’s TANAAMI!! AKATSUKA!! to the United States for the first time. Araki dropped by quickly during the exhibit’s opening weekend, commenting that it’s his first time in San Francisco. As a major Clint Eastwood fan, Araki enthusiastically spoke about the city’s significance in Eastwood’s career and planned to visit the filming locations for several of the director’s movies. Both exhibits will be on display until October 25, 2025, and entry is free to the public.
