an illustrated talk
Thursday April 25, 7:30 pm
The Auditorium, York St John University Creative Centre
presented by York International Shakespeare Festival
Four distinguished artists and academics, introduce the wonderful and diverse world of Manga Shakespeare, the combination of classic English theatre and iconic Japanese comic art.
Supported by a wealth of drawings and illustrations – many not seen before.
———————————————————————————————
Inko Ai Takita, a distinguished manga artist from Kyoto, Japan, currently resides in the UK after honing her craft at Kyoto University of Art & Design and later at Central Saint Martin’s College of Art & Design. Her works have graced esteemed institutions such as the British Museum and Victoria and Albert Museum, where she’s delivered manga workshops. Additionally, Takita’s collaborations with British artist David Blandy resulted in captivating projects like the manga posters for the London Underground’s Embankment station. Her published manga collaborating with Scottish comic writer Séan Michael Wilson, including titles like “Tale of Genji” (Tuttle) and the award-winning “Portrait of Violence” (New International), have been critically acclaimed. Furthermore, her illustrative contributions to the online theatre “Flight Paths” earned recognition at the Superfest Disability Film Festival 2021.
Minami, Ryuta Ryuta Minami is Professor of English at the Faculty of Communication Studies, Tokyo University of Economics, Japan. His research interests are early modern English drama, Shakespearean perforamnce in Asia and pop cultural recreations of Shakespeare. He has published extensively in English and Japanese. He co-edited Re-playing Shakespeare in Asia for Routldge and Performing Shakespeare in Japan Cambridge UP. His recent publications include: “Hello Sha-kitty-peare?: Shakespeares Cutified in Japanese Anime Imagination” in Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies 16/ 3 (2016), “‘The Very Basics for All of Us’: Fragments of Shakespeare in Japanese Anime and Manga” in Shakespeare’s Asian Journeys: Critical Encounters, Cultural Geographies, and the Politics of Travel (Routledg), “The Myths of Bold Visual and Conservative Verbal Interpretations of Shakespeare on Today’s Japanese Stage” in Local and Global Myths in Shakespearean Performance (Palgrave Macmillan), “What’s in a Name? Shakespeare and Japanese Pop Culture” in The Routledge Handbook of Shakespeare and Global Appropriation (Routledge), and “The ‘Epidemic Rage’ of Spouting Clubs in late 18th-century Britain: ‘Spouters’ Represented on Stage and in Print Media” in Journal of Communication Studies 059 (2024). He is currently working on comics/komiks adapation of Shakespeare in Asia and the 18th-century British theatre culture.
Yukari Yoshihara (Professor at the University of Tsukuba (Japan) ) is one of the organisers of the Graphic Shakespeare Competition 1-4 (with Ronan Paterson and Ryuta Minami). Her publication includes “Japanese novelizations of Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Macbeth” (2022), “Shakespeare in Japanese Pop Culture” (2022), “Robinsonades in Japan” (2021), “Bardolators and Bardoclasts: Shakespeare in Manga/Anime and Cosplay” (2020), “Toward “Reciprocal Legitimation” between Shakespeare’s Works and Manga”(2020), “Shakespeare and Japanese Cultural Tourism” (2020), “Ophelia and Her Magical Daughters: the Afterlives of Ophelia in Japanese Pop Culture” and “Manga and Shakespeare” (2020).
Chie Kutsuwada, UK based Japanese manga creator and illustrator. After graduating from Royal College of Art, London, she’s been creating many works, which are often very delicate and romantic in style. She creates story as well as illustration by herself like King of a Miniature Garden (2007 collected in The Mammoth Book of Best New Manga 2, Constable & Robinson), her first manga and Moonlight (2008 collected in The Mammoth Book of Best New Manga 3), which was shortlisted in Manga Jiman competition organized by UK Japan Embassy. She also has been working on some well-known titles such as Shakespeare’s As You Like It (SelfMadeHero, London) and Musashi Miyamoto’s The Book of Five Rings (Shambhala, Boston & London). She also has written and illustrated several how-to books such as 10 Step Drawing Manga and 10 Step Drawing Kawaii (Search Press, UK). She has recently been collaborating with an author Julian Sedgwick and has created Tsunami Girl (2021 Guppy Books, UK) which was nominated to several book prizes including the Carnegie Medal, and also their latest creation 100 Tales from the Tokyo Ghost Café (2023 Guppy Books, UK). Besides creating manga comics, she also attends many manga-related events in and out of the UK and runs manga workshops at schools, universities, libraries, and museums, such as the British Museum, the British Library, the Royal Academy of Arts, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. She regularly teaches some holiday manga courses at the Art Academy, London. She also has worked on projects for several others including UK Japan Embassy, Iceland Japan Embassy, BBC, Channel 4, CNN, Wagamama, and Winsor & Newton.
Ronan Paterson is an actor, director, lecturer and writer, who has worked on, taught, acted in and directed Shakespeare’s plays all over the world, from workshops in a Young Offenders Institution to masterclasses for producers and directors at China Central Television. He has published widely and spoken at many international conferences on Shakespeare in Performance, Shakespeare in Film, Shakespeare in Comics and Illustration, and theatre and film history. Over the years he has built several collections of Shakespeare-related artefacts, in particular illustrated volumes and comics. He is one of the judges of the international Graphic Shakespeare Competition.
Tickets £5 all – bookings through the link below
There is also an opportunity to participate in a public workshop with the artists on Friday 26 April from 2:30 pm to 6:00pm. Bring your work to share or make some while you’re there. Booking link here
We want to make it possible for as many members of the community to come to festival performances, so please consider buying a Pass it On Ticket which we can offer to community members who may not otherwise be able to attend.
