Studio Ghibli Exhibition 2017

The Studio Ghibli Exhibition was a delightful surprise, considering the ridiculously cold winter weather here in Korea. As I write this, the temperature outside is below 10 degrees Celsius. It was a nice reason to make my way downtown to Seoul, because I had not been downtown for a while. 

The exhibit itself was not too large and it certainly wasn't as hyped as the one a few years back. This exhibit was also at the Sejong Center, which from my experience have smaller exhibits. 

Still, the quality of the exhibit was pretty good, and the one perk of this exhibit was that they had some great original posters that were framed. The size of the posters were surprisingly large, giving a sense of scale and grandeur. 

There were also some great memorabilia littered around the exhibit, detailing the inside culture of studio Ghibli. There was an installation imitating the employers work space. There were calligraphy with inspirational phrases, and things like baseball team paraphernalia decorating the table, giving a sense of personality that we would never have known from just watching the films. 

There were great reference materials detailing the producers role and how they organized the production schedule, promotion plans, budgets, costs, cuts, etc. This part of the exhibit was very detailed and it was very insightful and educational, giving the viewer a realistic idea on how an animated feature is produced. To be honest, this part of the exhibit was my favorite part because it was also the most original material that I have come across when compared to all of the other studio exhibitions that dumb down the production aspects of animation. 

As a treat, there is an excellent installation of an airship which was the only area where photography was allowed. This mechanical marvel is large and it is accompanied by the characteristic sound effects from the films.