Images collage in Japanese manga about supernatural beings of Mizuki Shigeru

Abstract

   Japanese manga author Mizuki Shigeru is often regarded as a popularizer of traditional monster imagery. He created not only entertaining comics, but also popular science illustrated catalogs and encyclopedias, becoming the largest researcher and collector of Japanese folklore after ethnographer Yanagita Kunio. For his educational activities, he was awarded a number of awards and prizes. Preserving the images of Japanese monsters became a fundamental goal for him, in this article I will demonstrate how Mizuki Shigeru creates images of his manga characters based on picture books of the Edo period and ethnographic materials. At the same time, little attention is paid to the side of his work in which the influence of European fine art culture can be traced. This article aims to show the diverse imagery flourished Mizuki Shigeru’s comics, including images from American comics and paintings by European artists from the Renaissance to Surrealism. I will also try to turn to his graphic narratives in order to take a closer look at his strategy and to understand what is the specifics of Japanese graphic narrative.