In the world of horror manga, few names are viewed with as much reverence – and shudder – as Junji Ito; without a doubt the contemporary master of the genre. The multi-award winning 60-year-old artist is famous for his black-and-white graphic novels and short stories about body horror, supernatural horrors, societal cruelty and increasing madness. Ito’s magnum opus, “Uzumaki” (Spiral), explores a city’s fixation with its winding shapes, transforming a common pattern into a symbol of cosmic horror and inevitability.
The sinister beauty of Ito’s art is currently on display at the Setagaya Literary Museum in Tokyo until September 1 in the exhibition “Enchantment.” An expansive retrospective of a career spanning four decades, the exhibition features some 600 works—from childhood scribbles to recent illustrations to stunning figurines—that explore his themes, evolution, and sardonic take on our collective fear of death.
Despite Ito’s manga having been translated into more than thirty languages, this exhibition is – remarkably – the first exhibition of the artist’s work in Japan.
