Japanese Manga art exhibition bursts into colour in Barrow

Located in the town's central library, it contains a themed selfie station, feedback tree and a lending manga collection.

The Make Mine Manga touring exhibition launched on Monday (April 15) is free for anyone curious about manga, as well as the avid fan.

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The exhibition has been specially created by Paul Gravett, comic publisher, fan and author of Manga: 60 Years of Japanese Comics, and has been led by Bolton Library Services, on behalf of a consortium of libraries in the North West.

It’s been funded by Arts Council England under its Project Grants scheme and the Lakes International Comic Art Festival is one of the delivery partners.

Manga has become a pop-culture phenomenon in the UK and six of the top ten bestselling graphic novelists in Britain are by Japanese manga authors.

In this exhibition, visitors can explore how these comics evolved first in Japan and how their creators continue to expand the medium, and discover today’s generation of award-winning British talents making manga their own way into a truly global language.

Partner, The Lakes International Comic Art Festival is an annual comic art Festival and advocate for comic art.

Established in 2013, the not-for-profit festival takes place annually over a weekend in the Autumn , originally in Kendal, and, since last year, in multiple venues in Bowness-on-Windermere.

Barrow is its last port of call in the UK for the exhibition and runs until May 31 before it heads overseas to Greece.

The tour had previously visited Liverpool, Runcorn, St Helens, Southport, Birkenhead, Bolton and in  Manchester were several Manga workshops also took place.

In terms of South Lakes, comic fans still have the Lakes International Comic Art Festival which returns to Bowness-on-Windermere on Friday 27 – Sunday 29, September 2024.