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At the weekend after my friends and I had a very late brunch in Manchester I dragged them to the rather fantastic Urbis building to check out an exhibition called ‘How Manga Took Over the World’, which, as you’d imagine, was all about how Japanese graphic design style has influenced us in the West. I know purists will probably be a bit annoyed they called it ‘Manga’ rather than ‘anime’, but I let it slide since they probably just wanted it to sound more accessible. I only persuaded two of my friends to join me inside (the rest waited in the little park outside) despite it being a free exhibition, in fact, all the exhibitions at the Urbis are free. I don’t actually know much about anime, but I do know that I like the work of Terratag, Tado and Jon Burgerman, and those guys were represented in abundance, as well as several other artists that I recognised but can’t remember off the top of my head. The exhibition isn’t actually that big, I got around it in about 20 minutes, though I was rushing and not reading the explanations since I didn’t like to keep my friends waiting indulging my own interests whilst they drank medicinal Starbucks to alleviate the effects of the previous nights drinking. If you’re in Manchester city centre for any reason over the next few months (the exhibition runs until September 27th) then I highly recommend checking it out.

Click on through for a load of pictures (mostly shot from the hip since I was unsure of the photo policy).

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