I don't know much about manga, but I know what I like

[imomus]

I'm not by any means a manga fan. I'm basically much more interested in drawing than plot, and I find most manga visually bad, flat and boring. But I do go to Japanese cafes and flip through the printed stuff I find lying around, and in this way I've come across one manga artist I do find visually very striking: Taiyo Matsumoto. His drawing is energetic, stylish, imaginative, grotesque, otherworldly. I don't know what these books are about, but every panel is startling. You turn the page with your eyes and imagination hungry for more. Matsumoto is clearly a really talented artist. (He's also scripted films, but I hear they're not so good.) I'll defer to someone who knows a lot more about his work -- and manga -- than I do. This is an extract from a review by Ben Wooller of one of Matsumoto's books, 'No. 5':

'Plot takes a backseat to the images and concepts that are littered in every panel, on every page... People who are familiar with Matsumoto's three volume series Black and White will be aware of the artist's love of thrusting the reader into a world that is at first glance alien and surreal, but utterly familiar... Characters in the book wear animal masks, or talk to disembodied heads. 20th Century pop culture references are splattered throughout, from Matroshka, the near-silent woman eating M&Ms, to a Michael Jackson coffee mug, all in between sudden bursts of the old ultraviolence. The world is, on the outside, an environmental utopia, everything fitting into the surroundings - even the Council's planes being shaped like wasps, right down the stripes on the thorax. The bizarre is the everyday in the world of No. 5.



'Matsumoto's art is reminiscent of Hugo Pratt, with a touch of Frank Miller circa RONIN. It's been noted that his art, like that of Paul Pope, crosses cultural lines, merging European comic and manga sensibilities, with a confidence not often seen in comics. His ideas and visuals convey this. Matsumoto himself has said, "American comics are powerful and cool. European comics seem very intellectual. And Japanese comics are very light-hearted. If you could combine the best of all three, you could create some really tremendous work. That's my goal."

You can watch a little TV commercial for Matsumoto's latest book, Gogo Monster, here.