Otomo Katsuhiro’s much anticipated Genga ( original drawings ) exhibition begins its run in 2 days on the 9th of April, and there’s been a flurry of media coverage and activity as the Japanese press and numerous distinguished guests ( manga artists like Inoue Takehiko, Katsuya Terada, Koji Morimoto, Sadamoto Yoshikyuki, just to name a few ) descend for a preview. The official website has been updated with some very tasty background images that are perfect for wallpapers :
Read this article for my coverage on the Genga exhibition in Tokyo.
1
Visiting The Otomo Katsuhiro Genga Exhibition
Otomo Katsuhiro Genga Exhibition
Otomo Katsuhiro Tribute Exhibition – Angoulême
Genga – Otomo Katsuhiro Original Pictures Art Book Review
Tribute To Otomo Exhibition At Tower Records Shibuya, TokyoComments 11
April 8th, 2012 at 2:32 am
man, i can’t wait for this. i ordered the book and just got the new Brutus in the mail and it got me so excited to see more of this. even looking at the issue of Brutus i was blown away by the quality of his original works. even though i’ve seen his images in print before, getting to actually see the original works and breaking the fourth wall with his images is astounding. the amount of work put into his drawings really speaks of almost a bygone era of illustrators doing almost all of the work pre-digital. amazing.
April 8th, 2012 at 5:16 am
Really incredible. I can’t imagine making pages at that quality for almost a decade non-stop.
April 9th, 2012 at 1:06 am
Thanks for the Zip! I’d love to take a look, but it’s password protected.
April 9th, 2012 at 1:56 am
Reiz – That’s strange…I definitely didn’t password protect it when I created the zip file, and I just tried downloading it myself and unzipped it with no problems.
April 9th, 2012 at 2:15 am
@yonghow: I downloaded the zip again just now and you’re right, it works perfectly fine. The first time I downloaded, it was only half the size, so I guess something went wrong on my end and the incomplete file prompted BetterZip to go haywire and ask for a password. I’m sorry, my bad! Thanks again for the nice hires images!
April 13th, 2012 at 7:00 pm
I saw the exhibition this afternoon.
A must see! Made of 100% of original drawings and paitings for covers. Rare full pages of Otomo’s early work are shown. You can spend hours in the place admiring ALL the originalpages of Akira!
The real motorbike of Akira is also show. For 500 yens you can wear his jacket and sit on the vehicule. At the same place, you can see a wall where famous mangaka visitors made a drawing: for example Terrada Katsuya. Visitors can also draw if they want. There’re markers for it.
This exhib largely worths the 1500 yen ticket. I will see it again soon.
The catalog is somptuous, far more interesting than Kaba 2 and less expensive. You can buy it at the bookstore of the gallery. The scans show all the details of Otomo’s work on every drawing.
A great, great exhib.
I enjoyed it.
April 15th, 2012 at 7:22 am
gotta echo what Cobalt said…..went today (on Otomo’s birthday!) and it was just…..effing….amazing!!!!
seeing the intricate linework in real life? just breathtaking!!
the book is gorgeous….SO worth the money! I also picked up the CD which had the music that was playing at the exhibit. Very AKIRA-esque, but just different enough.
Also saw a short teaser for the new anime SHORT PEACE set in Edo period.
Otomo maniacs…you MUST check this out!!
I will be attending again for sure!
April 15th, 2012 at 12:48 pm
Cobalt60 / Josh – Thanks for the great information on the exhibition ! I was just curious about 2 things – the official website stated that due to popular demand tickets for each day will be on sale at the venue, is this already happening ? Previously it was stated that tickets had to be purchased before.
Also, the entry times are split into 3 slots in the morning and 2 in the afternoon, is there enough time to go through all the exhibit pieces in detail ? Which do you think will be a better slot to go ?
Thanks guys ! :]
April 15th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
man, i am so upset that i am not able to go to this right now. i have already preordered the book, so i’m just waiting to get that now, but still, i wish i could be there for that. if anyone has seen the recent BRUTUS issue, there was an Art Of Akira exhibit in Pittsburgh a few summers ago that they mentioned and showed some pictures of, and that was fantastic. getting to look at the actual frames and backgrounds was astonishing, i can only imagine getting to see his comic pages close up. shit.
April 15th, 2012 at 2:52 pm
I chose the 4PM time slot and with that I was able to stay until closing at 8PM, but I actually left after about an hour and a half because it was getting crowded and the line for the gift shop was long. There’s definitely time to see everything, but with sooooo many amazing pieces you really want to take the time to just admire them and drink in all the details. But as more and more people pour into the small room, it got harder to do. But I still revisited several pieces over and over.
I’m not sure that tickets were available at the venue yesterday…it was pretty crowded, since it was the first Saturday of the exhibit. I thought I heard people being referred to “Lawson” to buy tickets, so maybe they are not available at the venue just yet.
All the manga/illustrations are in one room and all the AKIRA pages are in a few other rooms….the AKIRA stuff is just insane…there’s no way to take in every single page…there’s just too much!
Zack, I remember reading about that exhibit in Pittsburgh and really regretted missing it. There were no AKIRA cels at this show, but the background paintings and some character cels from Cannon Fodder were on display and were fantastic!
April 15th, 2012 at 7:40 pm
Yes, you must buy tickets at Lawson before coming. I went Friday 1pm and it was perfect. Very few people. I could stay as long as I want on every picture. The Akira rooms deserves more time if you want to see every page in details, they are gorgeous. This is why I will come back. I strongly recommand to avoid week ends and the Golden Week.