Godsend for anime and manga lovers; Polar Bear Gallery in M50 is hosting its annual Japanese animation and Studio Ghibli manuscript exhibition, gathering around 350 hand-drawn manuscripts from over 20 classic Japanese anime series from the 1970s and 80s: Doraemon, Sailor Moon, Slam Dunk, Pokémon, Crayon Shin-chan, and beloved Studio Ghibli films such as Castle in the Sky, My Neighbor Totoro, and Nausicaä of The Valley of the Wind. We went to check it out. In summary? A lot of animation cels!

Showcased items are divided into two categories: Original Art, which serves as the blueprint of the scene, and Celluloid Art, the 2D animation hand-painted on sheets of celluloid to be photographed. The typical animated film runs at 24 frames (or "cels") per second. That comes to hundreds of thousands of cels for each of your favorite 20-minute anime episode. Every single one hand-painted. As you can imagine, cel animation was replaced by computer graphics as soon as it was cost-efficient. Animation cels are now mostly treated as collector's items and antiques. At Polar Bear Gallery's exhibition, you can also find a stunning collection of original posters from Studio Ghibli films, and pieces of manga manuscript drawn by Osamu Tezuka. Known as ‘the god of manga’, Tezuka created 700 manga series - a staggering 170,000 pages of drawings over the course of his career. The most well-known is his children’s series Astro Boy or Mighty Atom. Only a handful of manuscripts from that show remain in Japan. The 68rmb price might limit this exclusively to anime fans, but even laypeople may appreciate a close look at the strokes and colored lines rendered in precise, exquisite detail, the little annotations in the margins, and a chance to see the original manuscripts where iconic characters and scenes were brought to life. *** Japanese Anime Manuscript Exhibition is on at Polar Bear Gallery until Nov 11. It’s open from 10am to 6.30pm. Tickets are 68rmb. See all ongoing and upcoming art exhibitions on Shanghai on SmartShanghai's Art Calendar