With the history of Japan as a central theme, the Musée Guimet invites fans and the simply curious alike to discover manga’s much-ignored diversity and splendour.

The exhibition has two parts:

The first part is located on the third floor of the museum, and presents Japanese history as seen through manga, from the 1950’s up until the present day.
This part aims to explain manga to viewers (whether amateur or connoisseur) through the history of Japan. It focuses on three main points:

The first is their aesthetic and narrative diversity. The exhibition presents numerous styles of manga as yet unknown in France but with very interesting designs, composition and image/narrative relationship.

Second is the importance of context. To understand a manga, we need to be familiar with the elements that influenced the author (literature, television, sociological issues…)

Thirdly, manga artists have an uninhibited relationship with their past culture, which remains alive in contemporary culture; thus, the exhibition shows how they are not afraid to rewrite, reinvent or romanticise history.

The second part, in the rotunda on the 2nd floor, offers the visitor a contrastive insight into manga, with historical and legendary figures seen in the light of bygone graphic design.

The course of history of Japanese woodblock prints (ukiyo-e) was changed at the beginning of the 19th century, partly due to the reforms of the Kansei era at the end of the 1790s. The rise of censorship that followed, which especially affected the publishing milieu, led artists to turn away from portraits of the bijin (feminine beauties) and other themes related to Yoshiwara (a famous district of Edo, present-day Tokyo) towards other subjects; as well as the development of landscape paintings, which evolved greatly, portraits of Kabuk actors in historical plays were also popular, as were illustrations of famous episodes in Japanese history, both results of this censorship. 19th-century graphic design thus produced several archetypes of the historical hero figure and narrative processes that can be seen as the premises for contemporary manga.

Manga Corner :

To accompany the exhibition, the Musée Guimet will open a temporary manga reading-room in the museum’s rotunda (4th floor). Here, visitors can sit comfortably and discover manga and other books on the history of Japan, which will be provided free of charge.

CURATORS :

President of the Musée Guimet: Jacques Giès

Exhibition Curator: Jean-Baptiste Clais, curator at the Musée Guimet.
Co-curator: Jean-Marie Bouissou, Director of Research at Sciences-Po, Paris.

VISITING:

How to get to the Musée Guimet

Ticket Prices: Entry to the exhibition is included in the museum’s entrance ticket (€7.50 normal rate; €5.50 reduced rate; Free for under 26s-conditions apply)

PARTNERS: