Bara by Letterpress

Gay manga–or “bara” as it’s referred to online–is awesome. Unlike the much more well-known “BL” genre (yaoi), no one has published gay manga in English. Die hard fans of “bara” in North America must order the untranslated books overseas or hunt down bootleg scans on the Internet.

When my friend Blake Besharian invited me to make a series of prints on his letterpress, I decided to pay one of my favorite gay manga artists homage. I collaged disparate panels from Seizoh Ebisubashi‘s manga My Hometown Hospitality into disjointed visual narratives, emphasizing the transitions, exteriors, and moments of stillness that establish the subtle mood and tone in Ebusibashi’s artwork.

“Bara by Letterpress” is a limited edition series of six prints. If you’d like a set, here’s your chance! Post this video on your blog/Tumblr/Twitter and then leave a comment below with a link to your site. Next week, I’ll randomly select one commenter to receive a set of all six prints! (Note: The whole series have been given away to FS readers. Thanks everyone!)

Here are some links to help you investigate gay manga on your own:

“Bara” Resources:
Bara – Wikipedia article.
G-Men – G-Men is the foremost magazine that publishes gay manga. Site mostly in Japanese.
Japanese Gay Art – Australian fine art blog that features gay manga artists including Gengoroh Tagame and Jiraiya.
G-Project – Japanese store that allows international orders of gay manga.
Seizoh Ebisubashi – Tubmlr for the artist, including sketches of works in progress.
Gengoroh Tagame – Mixed Japanese and English site for the legendary Tagame.

22 Responses to “Bara by Letterpress”

  1. Patrick October 26, 2011 at 12:20 pm #

    Great to finally give the genre the exposure it deserves! I always felt the same way – the quiet moments were the parts I loved best. One particular panel of a couple guys riding a motorcycle together particularly stuck in mind through the years since I saw it, and again, I have no idea the title of this comic, nor the story attached, but it was an image that expressed enough in one frame sidestep the incoherence of a rough translation. I wonder what the original artists would think of your project? Have you written to any of them?

  2. Bear's Art October 26, 2011 at 2:49 pm #

    Great post, I totally love the video! Bara and bear art should definitely get better promotion :)

  3. Jonathan H. October 26, 2011 at 3:27 pm #

    I love the collage style chosen to show off the pieces. A chosen harmony between story within the story arc that can reflect the nature without being literal about the story telling. I’d love to own these. I posted the video over at buttpaint.tumblr.com

  4. Joshua October 26, 2011 at 4:12 pm #

    http://jjarrettblog.tumblr.com/post/11961350822/futureshipwreck-bara-by-letterpress-is-a

    POSTED!

  5. SMKFLWR October 26, 2011 at 4:15 pm #

    Bara rules!

  6. anand October 26, 2011 at 4:30 pm #

    the prints look great! i love jiraiya’s work and i’ve seen some of tagame’s, but i hadn’t heard of the other artists mentioned in the video.

  7. katherine October 26, 2011 at 5:50 pm #

    These are beautiful, and totally amazing.

  8. Elwyn October 26, 2011 at 10:48 pm #

    I love bara! Though you can’t get english translations, it’s pretty popular in spain and you can get most of Jiraiya’s work there. It gives me good incentive to keep up my spanish!
    I love what yr doing here, super-sweet!

  9. TW October 27, 2011 at 4:25 am #

    Really beautiful. Loved watching your process as well.

  10. Yann October 27, 2011 at 5:49 am #

    Bara is fantastic ! We have some bara manga already translated in France, but sadly none by Ebith or Jiraiya yet. The best way to find them is to go to the source, and that’s what we’re going to do in december with my boyfriend in Tokyo <3. There has been an exhibition of Bara paintings, original drawings and prints in Paris last week, and it was beautiful.

  11. ?çimdeki ay? October 27, 2011 at 10:23 am #

    Great work and video Graham.

    Here is the article;

    http://www.icimdekiayi.com/graham-kolbeins-ve-tipo-baski-bara.html

  12. Jack Chapman October 27, 2011 at 3:48 pm #

    Hey Graham,

    I love this project, particularly the line work.

    I did two posts on my blog about it:

    http://wedontknowjack.tumblr.com/post/12007090654/more-photos-of-grahams-bara-by-letterpress#postNotes

    http://wedontknowjack.tumblr.com/post/12006911118/a-friend-of-mine-called-graham-the-awesomely-cute

    All the best!

  13. Gerardo October 29, 2011 at 11:33 pm #

    Want one!!! i love tagame and seizo works, takeshi matsu is quiet good too, well enough talk, cheers from Argentina.

  14. Mike O. November 9, 2011 at 7:05 pm #

    Lagged on some of my blog feed, so just saw this. I love it. Re-posted it, even if the prints may be gone. Keep me in the loop if another run is made – these are awesome, dude!

  15. Christian Fernández Mirón November 10, 2011 at 8:57 am #

    A little late but fully amazed. Thank you for this!

  16. Graham Kolbeins November 10, 2011 at 9:43 am #

    Thanks to everyone who commented and blogged about Bara! You guys did a really good job of spreading the love, so everyone who commented on this post will be getting their choice of one free print!

    In addition, the official winner (chosen via random number generator) is commenter #5, SMKFLWR, and he’ll be getting a complete set of six prints! Congratulations! I’ll be e-mailing you all shortly, to get your mailing addresses.

  17. Jonathan H. December 10, 2011 at 5:23 pm #

    Have the prints been sent out yet? I’m hoping to give mine for christmas :)

  18. Fei January 3, 2012 at 3:52 am #

    Love the new blog’s look, and the content. I love manga, especially the more independent ones (everything on Same Hat Same Hat for example!). Your writing is still amazing, as always. Hope to see you again sometime, back in LA perhaps?

  19. Ali January 16, 2012 at 4:50 am #

    thanks for opening my eyes to Bara, I am now on a googling frenzy of the genre.

    I posted about it on my blog. please send me the prints because I am poor and would like nice things.

    http://gaybash.tumblr.com/post/15943825040/ive-been-googling-bara-for-the-past-hour

  20. Bochub January 26, 2012 at 7:15 pm #

    Wow this is enlightening and amazing for the West to appreciate Asian manga at this level! Kudos!
    I have a compilation bara book I bought from Taiwan and a Samson mag I got from Tokyo and they are heavenly. Even though not a comic fan myself, I can fully appreciate the artwork that goes into it. Simply beautiful.
    Graham sums it best in the video “Bara’s filled with these vividly rendered scenes of hardcore sex and that’s always fun. But what I really love about the genre are the moments when it slows down and becomes tender.”
    PS: Wish I’ll find my tender moment with a soul mate to travel with and experience the world together in bliss!

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