Mr. Koichiro Matsushita, a lecturer from the Department of Manga, Kyoto University of Art and Design (KUAD), conducted a series of Yonkoma manga – or four-panel comics – workshops at TNUA in March.

There were a total of three workshops arranged by TNUA’s Department of Animation for its first-year, second-year and third-year students respectively to learn the art of Yonkoma manga.

During the workshops, each of the students had to create his or her own four-panel comics to introduce himself or herself.

Mr. Matsushita is known for his Yonkoma manga and digital manga. His work, “The Girl Living Alone,” has been very popular among online readers, and a print version has also been published.

The lecturer from KUAD – a sister school of TNUA – taught the students at the workshops how to use the manga-drawing tools and how to draw manga. He also showed some of his manga manuscripts.

Apart from the workshops, Mr. Matsushita also gave a lecture at a general education course of the School of Film and New Media, during which he talked about the development and present situations of Japan’s manga market.

Osamu Tezuka, revered as the “god of manga,” opened up a very important chapter in Japanese manga, according to Mr. Matsushita.

But the approach of the digital age has resulted in declining sales of comic books, and in contrast the number of readers enjoying online manga from moile phones, tablets and computers has been soaring. Mr. Matsushita thinks this is an unavoidable trend.