Alright... This was about two months ago, but my art teacher at school said she doesn't consider Manga as Art. She also said that drawing manga and selling it isn't the right thing to do if I'm going to be a Mangaka. I talked about this situation with my brothers and sisters and they got really upset. I know this doesn't matter, but I actually cried when I got home. My DREAM is to become a MANGAKA for Christ's SAKE!! I'm still feeling a little bit down about this situation because I kind of do think my art is a little bit bad. I'm in her Independent Studies Art class right now and plan switch teachers. o_o

If you want to see my drawings go to: http://witchofstories.deviantart.com/

Your art is fine. Switching art teachers why though? Because of what they said?

Off topic but, you're... gonna go to Japan just to be a comic book artist? Because Mangaka means just that, a comic book artist. In Japan. Sorry, it's just a pet peeve of mine when someone says something like that, carry on with your dream of becoming a Japanese comic book artist though.

Actually, that arises with many art teachers. It's really a matter of perspective, and it's your choice what you want to be in the future. It doesn't need to be considered art by everyone in the world to be enjoyed.

Some people don't consider digital drawings "drawings", and it's just opinions.

It's not like she is one to judge what is right and wrong to sell, especially if pretty much everything is being sold these days.

Does it really matter what she thinks?

>>2 I have my reasons to go to Japan and it's NOT to just become a Mangaka, but I was just feeling a bit down of what she said about my art styles and stuff.

>>3 I have to agree with the digital drawings. I consider it art, but i know a guy who doesn't, but not the point... lol. I guess its that shes a teacher and I'm her student. Some say i should listen to her, but others say she is just trying to expand my media towards other art such as landscapes, realistic drawings, etc... I understand that REALLY well, but i also think a teacher should ENCOURAGE her students not force them to go into her art style.

>>4 That's just how some people are. Is she actually forcing you, or is she just not approving of that art style?

Does anything ACTUALLY change from her being your teacher? A teacher is not necessarily more talented than you, but just knows more and has more experience. I don't understand, why does it not matter if some random guy disagrees with you, but suddenly it matters if it's a teacher? Or correct me if that's not what you meant.

Not considering the manga style as art is a bit ignorant, but it isn't uncalled for. Japanese-style comic art is relatively easy to pick up compared to personalized styles, because it has a template. It's easy to copy without too much effort, so it's pretty much babeh's first style when it comes to artistry.

But while it's easy to pick up, it's far from easy to master. Just like any truly developed art style, there's much more depth to it than could be covered by focusing your energy into one source. One must learn realism, to gain knowledge of anatomy and the basic 'physics' behind everything in an art piece; one must learn many other styles (which I cannot name because fuck I'm not an artist) to gain depth and develop their own unique style.

Never tell someone you are a certain type of artist before you have truly defined your own style. Coming from the perspective of friends of mine who recently went to major in art in college, wanting to be a mangaka is just a phase before you develop your own unique style that defines you as an artist. Everyone who has this mindset is quickly snapped out of it when they realize the sheer breadth of possibilities art offers.

In a way, your teacher was right. What you and I referred to as the manga style isn't really a style - it's a motif that is shared among Japanese artists. You cannot technically become a mangaka if you're not Japanese, and perhaps she was trying to point out that naivety. If your teacher is any good, the statement was meant to gauge your insight - are you open-minded, or close-minded to the art world? Are you capable of adapting your own style, or will you force yourself to be fixated on what is ultimately a narrow and shallow road to developing a style based entirely off of someone else's?

Keep in mind I never said drawing like manga artists is a bad thing - my friends still do, from time to time. But it is an invaluable tool to be at the very least acquainted with other styles, to keep your options open and your range broad.

tl;dr stop being such a weeaboo and lern 2 art :V

>>5 Lol... Thanks! I know it doesn't matter what a teacher or what anybody else thinks about manga. What I thought about my art teacher is that she was being too close-minded.

>>6 I want to go to an art school to learn more about anatomy and stuff. Is that REALLY true that I can't become a Manga artist if I'm not Japanese?? O_o

>>7 Learn to spell... -_-;

>>8 He's kidding.

>>8

>>7 was me, a second time, as >>9 says. It was a shorter, less informative, half-jokingly more offensive way to state the entirety of >>6.

...If you read my post carefully, I corrected myself and denoted manga as not an art style, but an indicator of origin. If your only intention is to receive the label "mangaka," you are already on the wrong path. If you intend to develop your own style, you could go as far as saying you are heavily influenced by the anime style - it's just a technicality, really, and anime has so many different unique styles to it in the first place that you aren't really defining your style at all by labeling it as such.

Bottom line I'm trying to say is, what's the point of only drawing anime? Even if it's what you primarily draw, what's the point if that's all you can draw? You'll be a drop of water in the sea - thousands of amateur artists out there get good at someone else's style, be it anime or otherwise, but only a few can claim a drawing style for their own.

Someone in another thread said this quote related to the same issue: One must learn to walk before they can run. Don't base yourself off of a template (manga); get a broad foundation (consisting of the exploration of different styles) and work from the ground up. By the time you've done all that, you may find you actually don't want to be a manga artist after becoming something else entirely - something that you own, that nobody else may lay claim to.

>> 10 Lol! XD okay.

That's true... My oldest brother told me the same thing a long time ago, "Would if you found out that you don't like drawing manga?" That got me really thinking, but at the same time I have an important reason why I want to become a mangaka.

Who cares what you teacher says lol? Just keep moving.

just follow your own heart, don't listen to what others think. that's their opinion.

>>13 I would never imagine Len saying that to me!! (Because I'm a Len kagamine fan! :D)

To All: Thanks for the advice guys! I'll take your words of wisdom til the day I die. I really appreciate all the comments.

manga is art, art is ment to be appreciated if others appreciate it and buy it cuz they like it, its your art, dont listent to that art teacher hes teaching from a book not the heart

that teacher can go fuck them self cause manga is art. my art teacher is really cool he lovwes manga anime comics all that he even has hes own manga series is called -the fall- he teachs you how to draw manga if thats what you like. so forget that teach manga is art every thing is art pencils tables key boards every thing is art. and you can sell it that is what art is for you to make money from it. so follow your dream and dont let that teach tell you wrong

>>16 Thanks! XDDD Yea, my art teacher said I was like stereotyping other manga artists... And what I found out in class is that she was teaching her students how to paint paintings from previous artists! D8<

Oh good lord. Is nobody listening? How many tl;dr posts do I need to make to drill it into your weeaboo skulls that you're missing the point entirely?

Fine. I'm going to be very strong-minded about the topic now, if that gets your attention. Manga is NOT an art form. It isn't! It simply denotes the origin of a style, and defines NOTHING about the style itself.

If you say it does, and compare your style to a manga you've read, congratulations. You copied someone else's art style, and it just happened to be someone from Japan. Can you give an artistic basis behind it, other than "I draw eyes like this because uguu"?

The argument that comes up immediately is "there's nothing wrong with drawing like manga artists." Fine, you're right. But you're bashing on your art teacher, whose very job is to expand your horizons and open you up to art in general, for telling you what amounts to "you're restricting yourself, stop being a damned weeaboo."

Consider this. You learn much about many different forms of art - the nuances of so many styles, that you have literally limitless options when it comes to how you want to express your art. You decide to teach this art to someone.

Then they come in and say "I want to draw like this kawaii japanese artist desu." Suddenly, they don't want to draw ANYTHING besides that one, single art form that they barely know. Would you not feel frustration at their sheer ignorance? You might even lash out yourself, and tell them honestly, what they know is not art, but a cancer upon the world of art itself - a blight that prevents potentially good artists from being worth a damn at anything else.

Look at this. And this. And this. Do you think any of these artists simply refer to themselves as "anime artists"? Can you contribute everything in their artwork to learning manga style?

Style is something you layer on top of actually knowing how to art in the first place. Every good artist out there has some base that isn't simply anime, unless they have a knack for tracing and learning from that alone. But then they wouldn't be looking for art lessons.
If you aren't that serious of an artist though, I'm sorry for being harsh - but you shouldn't be looking into art classes if you only want one thing out of it. It's a waste of money, and a waste of time for the teacher.

dont listen to misut hes troll just look at how long and ofensiv his exquzitlee gammar'd post is he is obviously here be unsupportive and mean towards u and ur dream.

u go be the best kawaii desu drawfag you can b=! im sure there is a bright future for u if u jus stik to ur sugoi gunz and draw ur anime-styled hart out.

>>19 Look!! I understand what you are saying! I get it! I'm still going to become a manga artist though because I want the world to know something about my culture. I just didn't like how my art teacher told me in my face that my art wasn't art. I have a goal in my life that I want to fulfill here before I die!

>>19 Woops! That was suppose to be for >>18 LOL!!

>>18 Just to let you know, I don't copy anyone else's art style. I may copy their art, but that's only for me to expand on how a body should look in different ways. You should watch an anime called Bakuman. It's a great anime that inspired me!

I looked at the drawings that you made yami and this is my opinion they looked great

My statement was not directed necessarily towards the integrity of your own artwork, since I really don't have a basis to go off of (nor do I need one in this situation); it was directed at the constant bashing of your art teacher whose point of view I feel is misunderstood here.

Perhaps your teacher was a bit harsh in stating that, but as I said, I imagine it stems from the frustration of only seeing aspiring mangaka time and time again, as the true value of art is slowly being lost to the rabid sweep of anime fandumb.

The most accepted term for art is along the lines of absolutely anything you can express yourself with - a product of the right side of your brain, and a portrayal of your creativity. In this sense, she is wrong. In the sense that she is your art teacher, however, she is drawing a line between what she considers respectable art and what she perceives as a mere tracing of someone else's. It's teaching a lesson through negative reinforcement of what is thought of as a bad habit, and frankly I like it when people are upfront about things like that instead of beating around the bush. Did you want her to sugarcoat it? Instead of saying "that isn't real art," which is an exaggeration to make a point, maybe you would have preferred "That's very good! No, it's totally alright for you to never learn properly from me, as long as you're having fun and I'm getting paid~"

Honestly, as I said earlier, the anime style is one of the easiest to pick up due to its simplicity... but it is the hardest to make your own. You need your own nuance and established style, otherwise you really do appear to be copying the 10,000 other amateur anime artists. It doesn't matter how good you may be at it - and I'm sure you are, really - but to be honest, I can never tell the difference between them unless there's really something unique to their style.

...And fuck your shit, Ayanavi D:<

Oh my gosh! That's awful. I've been hearing a lot of people have been having trouble with art teachers accepting manga art. I'm lucky, my art teacher really doesn't care. As long as I'm drawing. It is good to sell it and I hope you become a great mangaka! I want to publish my own manga with a friend when I get older hopefully with a lot of help. We should start a petition or something in the future to get manga recognized as true art. It's just like any other drawing. It's really helped me improve in my drawing skills. It is to come up with your own drawing style in it. But it's easy to pick up. I taught myself with the help of a lot of guides and practice. I'm still working on coming up with my own style that's easy to draw :)I'll go visit your site and get back to you.

You're really good. I forgot to add you. I'm byakuyarox1. Most of my art is on theotaku.com under the same name. But I have a lot of bad pictures (I need to delete them)

.....artists sell their works.....I don't see what she's talking about

Exactly. Popular mangaka make so much money. All you need it good art and a great story line.

I don't understand.... Why isn't manga art? Are you saying that Hayao Miyazaki's art isn't art? Then it'll be saying that marvel isn't art too! @_@ Confusing.......

Hayao Miyazaki's art is art. If someone asked me what style he uses though, I wouldn't call it manga, or anime. That's uninformative and kind of ignorant.

Hayao Miyazaki's art tends to be fantastical, with steampunk themes, and in terms of character designs he's great at showing variation between a variety of character types - he isn't restricted to stereotypes that you would associate with anime.

I can identify his works when you compare it to any other japanese artist, because he has developed it into his own style. To scale it down to being "anime" is just like scaling Picasso's artwork to being "drawings." It's not wrong - it's painfully broad.

You seem to misunderstand what I'm saying, and frankly I can't see why. I'm not reposting what I said, you can read it and understand it yourself.

Oh man, >>30

I don't even anymore. At first it was funny, but jesus christ now I'm not sure if you're trolling or just this ignorant.


What Misuto keeps trying to say is that "anime" and "manga" are not "art". They are blanket terms for the origin of each individuals artists work. So while "manga" isn't an art, the person who draws it is still considered an "artist", not because he draws manga, but because he or she draws their own individual style.

Saying you want to draw manga is fine, but it's the same as saying you want to make Roman art. What kind of roman art? Rome had a lot of artists, they all did things differently. Roman isn't "art", it's the blanket term for a great deal of art that shares similar attributes and come from the same region.

We are not arguing that the drawings you find in manga/anime aren't art. We're arguing that "manga" or "anime" isn't art itself - It's the blanket term for the variety of individual styles from a specific area that share similarities. This is most likely why your teacher said it isn't art - Not because she disbelieves the work itself isn't considered art, but because the term you told her you were aspiring towards was a vaguely defined blanket term for a wide range of styles, and thus implied that you really didn't know what you were talking about.

Now either you are entirely misunderstanding the point here, you're trolling, or so help me god you're just ignorant as fuck. I sincerely hope it's the first one.

>>32 Thank you for clearing that up.. I'm not trolling or being ignorant. I just didn't understand why manga isn't art... But now you cleared that up, I understand now. But is it true that a foreigner can not become a mangaka?

Mangaka, I believe, literally refers to the person drawing or writing a manga. Manga is a japanese comic.

A mangaka is a comic book artist, as insertnamehere mentioned earlier - It's just the japanese term for comic book artist. A foreigner can become one, but it's the same thing as becoming a comic book artist in the states, because the two titles "mangaka" and "comic book artist" mean the same thing in different languages.

So you can still very much become one if you like, but unless you live in an area where japanese is the most commonly spoken or written language, you won't be called that. If you are live in an area where english is the common, then you're a comic book artist. If you live where russian in the common then... you're whatever the russian word for comic book artist/mangaka is.

Hope that clears things up for you - There is no real difference between the terms aside from the language being used.

>>32 you kinda took the words right outta my mouth.... or fingers in this case.. the only thing i want to add to all this is that i saw a comment earlier saying you cant become a mangaka unless you're in japan, thats not true, there are publishers in england and america who publish manga from they're repsective area's, del rey was one such publisher who dealed with eastern and western manga

Alright, thanks! People have been telling me that a foreigner can't become a Mangaka... And of course I'm going to live in Japan as soon as I take a Japanese Language Class and lots of art classes that deal with anatomy(because I'm having trouble drawing bodies).

(^for the more dense, this is still Misuto)

...So you're going to move to Japan, learn Japanese, and learn how to draw SPECIFICALLY the manga art style, just so people can call you a mangaka? That was your main concern, and not whether or not your art was worth a damn?

I was questioning why I felt so rageful at this thread. It felt misplaced, and I felt like I was doubting the thoughts of a real artist.
Now I remember why it's justified. You're exactly the person that gives real artists, whether they like anime or not, a bad name.

All of my disappoint. Truly, I'm sorry I believed you had good intentions. I even thought you art was pretty decent and had potential, but looks like you're going to have an active hand in squandering it on a pointless, counter-nationalistic ideal.


Done with this thread. I think my perspective on japanophiles just corroded a bit more.

>>37 Please don't make this a big deal... As I said a million times, "I have my own reasons WHY I want to become a Mangaka!" I made my own decision and you don't have to worry about it. I still think Manga is STILL art because it's a certain art style. Maybe you should try to understand what my culture and I went through before writing on my thread... Plus, I thought Dollars was suppose to help people, not discourage them.

Actually Dollars aren't even technically supposed to help anyone - that's a common mistake. We're a community that is predisposed towards being more helpful towards our other members.

That being said, we can still greatly disagree and even hate each other. Community doesn't mean everyone gets along with everyone else.

Besides, >> Maybe you should try to understand what my culture and I went through before writing on my thread...

Maybe you should try explaining what you and your culture went through before complaining about people not understanding. How I about I repeatedly reference the main character of a story I wrote and then accuse you of not understanding the circumstances behind the plot?

tl;dr - You have a reason. That's nice, but unless we know it then we don't really have any reason ourselves to care. If it's a private reason then we don't need to know, but if you plan on using it as an explanation, then leaving us in the dark will just make you obnoxious.

Anyway, suto said he was done with the thread and I'm only posting here because people not explaining their excuses is a pet peeve of mine.

Carry on.

My culture is probably forgotten because it was mentioned in history... We played a BIG role in the Vietnam War to help the Americans fight and escape from the Vietnames. I want the whole world to be reminded that we Hmong people are still here in the world and will not perish in the woods. I believe that publishing my people's stories will encourage us to brighten in the future.

So you want to become a Japanese comic book artist to write about the Hmong... Can't you just stay happy being in America to do that? Does it really need to be in Japan? Or hell, you could actually write a novel or a poem or some shit. I mean, to choose a Japanese comic out of every other possible literature medium to write about the Hmong... Any particular logic you want to explain to us why? Hell, you could've chosen Chinese comics, or Manhua as they call it. But Manga? Really... I mean, logically speaking, using Manhua as the medium would be more logical, since(using wikipedia for this) the Hmong live in, among other places, China, right? Well whatever.

Yeah, along the lines of what insertnamehere said - I don't really understand why you find it so important to be a japanese comic book artist to tell your story.

Or even an artist, for that matter. This kind of thing sounds more like what you'd read from a novel, because comics rarely focus on a specific culture. I mean if you can manage it, then that's great - You seem pretty set on doing it in comic form, and there really isn't a reason not to do it that way.

Just, comics generally aren't aimed towards the age groups and readers who care about these things.

Further more, what is your reasoning for specifically wanting to be a japanese comic book artist? If they helped the americans fight/escape the Vietnamese, then wouldn't it be a better idea to get it published with the intended crowd being the people/culture who have the best reasons to be grateful to them or remember them? I don't understand why or how the japanese play into this besides personal preference...

It's rather confusing. I mean, did you just have two individual goals of "become a comic book artist" and "get people to know my culture is still out there", and just decide to smash them together and sprinkle japan onto it just because "Hey, japan!"?

Who would the intended audience of your book/comic be? Don't say the world - Realistically speaking, that isn't an intended audience. What age group or nationality do you personally want to pick up your work?

After you've decided that, you should probably look into changing your goals to suit what the age group of that nationality will most likely approve of and/or actively pick up on their own.

If you're dead set on a Manga, then you'd need unique characters for it, an overarching plot line for your story, and somehow tie it all back into your initial goal of getting people to know your culture is still out there.

There are a lot of logical inconsistencies here, and I fear you've skipped a lot of the vital pre-requisites in favor of trying to pursue your goal.

Now that does not mean, in any way, to stop pursuing it. However, if you truly want to achieve your goal then blindly running after it will be painful and stands a good chance of failure. Instead of jumping from where you are now to the end result, take smaller steps at different stages of your life to build a platform for you to stand on and get results.

A problem most people end up finding in their dreams is that they found the path from where they started to where they want to go to be much more difficult to get through than initially thought - So instead of isolating yourself to one possibility for your overall goal, give constant, serious thought to your goal, what you will need to achieve, how you can achieve it best, where best to market it, what medium would be most effective to do it, etc.

I think what you will eventually run into is this - What is more important to you? Getting your culture known? Or being a comic book artist? Can you be assured to do both? If you come to a cross roads where you have the chance to do one or the other, which would you choose? Have you really planned out how to accomplish either of these goals?

None of these questions are things you need to, nor do I expect you, to have the final answer to right now. However, they are questions you should keep in mind and constantly re-evaluate through your life while you chase your dreams.

Well, Japan covered every culture in the world and I haven't read any manga about Hmong people. I just want to change the scenery in manga instead of people reading the same old culture again and again.

every culture in the world? So the Ainu, the Abron, the Abiphones, the Aeta, the Afar, Agaw, Phu La, Picts, the Turks? Have they covered them? Or how about Parsi? Or maybe Oglala? If those names aren't familiar to you, then these might. How about the Mulatto? Mongols? Mohave? Any of those? Please consider the words you're about to say before you say them, I doubt Japan has covered every single culture in the world.

People can put those into manga if they want to. I'm doing this my own way because I believe I can do it.

I'll leave it on this note. Chinese have Manhua. You couldn't have chosen that medium instead of Manga? I mean, if it were up to me, I'd use Manhua to maintain my pride, seeing as how the Hmong are in China among other places. I mean, if you wanted to, you could have it adapted into a Manga later on, from a business and prideful view point.

Look here, making it as a manga has a low chance of having it changed into english, normally. There are scanlators and shit, I hope you see what I'm getting at. Your readers are gonna be Japanese. And I'm pretty sure they're not gonna give a fucks crap about who the Hmong are and what they did. I know I wouldn't, seeing as how i just heard about them now. They're regular people, the readers are gonna want action, drama, adventure. You're gonna have to fuck up your adaptation, which would make it even more disgraceful if you really want to tell their story. Do you see what I'm saying? Which is why it's more better to be a novel, hell a Light Novel if you want some type of pictures in it. Or go the Manhua route to still have pride in it.

It's just my opinion from the viewpoint of someone who really cares about pride, heritage, shit like that.

Maybe she's getting you to not draw in that style in art class? :\

you should get the essentials down even if youre not going to use them in the future

You know, the AR point system? If you don't, it's when you reas books, and take tests on them to get a certain ammount of pointsby the end of each six weeks.

Well, every kid (pretty much) at my old school loved manga, and those who didn't were shunned, but they were not on the AR book list!! EVEN THOUGH THEY SOLD MANGA AT THE BOOK FAIRE!!! Ahem, anyway, after much discussion, the WONDARFULL librarian, who was my best friend's mom, put some manga on the AR list.

And the school lived happily ever after,
The End... wait...


In any cast, YOUR ART TEACHER IS A BIZNITCH!!! How can you tell a child that her dream is stupid and that it's wrong???? I wanna slap her across the face!!!
Well anyway, don't ever give up on your dream!! It's what you wanna do? DO IT!!! TAKE THAT COMMENT SHE MADE, AND USE IT AS MOTIVATION!!!!! MAKE THE DAMN-WELL BEST MANGA THAT HAS EVER EXHISTED, AND THROW THE PROFITS FORM IT AT HER SMELLY FACE, AND SAY, "Manga is real art" AND THEN LEAVE!!!!

Ahem... 0///0 sorry, got a little carried away, I spent all my middle school doing that for the kids in my class, so dreams are a serious subject for me, but really, never give up.

>>49

Did you read this thread, or just comment on the OP's post?

Op, sorry

>>51 You should read the entire thread, it'll explain everything, instead of the usual replies just comforting people, going "Aww your teacher's a bitch" or "aww, don't let your dreams die" or some other shit. Because that will happen, I'm not gonna lie, but I will make damn sure it doesn't happen now.

ok

he's not just sure. he's damn sure.

Wow this thread is so confusing now

i watched juu on DA
:D

wow thats realy good art yami

Wow! I just looked at your art and it's really good!!!! Are you taking requests?

So, this was, in effect, an art advertisement thread?

>>59 yes fruit. yes it was.

my art teacher last year (I'm a junior currently) says the same thing. doesnt like me drawing manga -_-

whatsoever, art or not, the hell what they might say, draw anytime you want. A passionate mangaka would have more fans and future than an illogical art teacher.

Dont let that get you down. Personally, to me manga is art. it's just different from other kinds. As an art teacher she needs to be more open minded (thats a fault on her part). My art teacher didn't like us drawing manga because she wanted to see us doing other styles. Though when we brought her pages and pages of a comic we had been working on, she called it fantastic and said: Wow *insert my name here* this is really good! Im sure you'll be a fantastic artist one day.

Long story short... I had put my manga into my portfolio when i was applying for one of the top art schools in America. I got in by the way, with a half tuition scholarship.

MFW people didn't read the thread to see the legitimate points made and just go back to the pitying "poor you" crap
MFW I have no face

pinta has no faceh? D: i draw un fer you

this post doesn't seem like it was made long ago, i can see whai you'd all keep commenting, but it actually was resolved. Extra advice is fine, but....saying and cushioning an artist will get them nowhere, you have to tell them the truth and show them reality, truth is people will not always say that your art is the best, and truth is the people who you will get money out of the most will either be REALLY rich people, or the other people who just buy it cuz they fancy it. Most people won't go to a store or museum and look at manga and say: I want this artwork in my house!

Also, an artist has to be able to take constructive criticism, saying that they're going to do fine in life with where they are nao is a lie. So say it like it is. An artist has to be strong.

Your teacher lacks research. No, actually,he needs no research. Manga is obviously a form of art.

>>66 obviously didn't read the thread. Excuse me whilst I jack post >>18 in it's entirety.

----------------------------------------

Oh good lord. Is nobody listening? How many tl;dr posts do I need to make to drill it into your weeaboo skulls that you're missing the point entirely?

Fine. I'm going to be very strong-minded about the topic now, if that gets your attention. Manga is NOT an art form. It isn't! It simply denotes the origin of a style, and defines NOTHING about the style itself.

If you say it does, and compare your style to a manga you've read, congratulations. You copied someone else's art style, and it just happened to be someone from Japan. Can you give an artistic basis behind it, other than "I draw eyes like this because uguu"?

The argument that comes up immediately is "there's nothing wrong with drawing like manga artists." Fine, you're right. But you're bashing on your art teacher, whose very job is to expand your horizons and open you up to art in general, for telling you what amounts to "you're restricting yourself, stop being a damned weeaboo."

Consider this. You learn much about many different forms of art - the nuances of so many styles, that you have literally limitless options when it comes to how you want to express your art. You decide to teach this art to someone.

Then they come in and say "I want to draw like this kawaii japanese artist desu." Suddenly, they don't want to draw ANYTHING besides that one, single art form that they barely know. Would you not feel frustration at their sheer ignorance? You might even lash out yourself, and tell them honestly, what they know is not art, but a cancer upon the world of art itself - a blight that prevents potentially good artists from being worth a damn at anything else.

Look at this. And this. And this. Do you think any of these artists simply refer to themselves as "anime artists"? Can you contribute everything in their artwork to learning manga style?

Style is something you layer on top of actually knowing how to art in the first place. Every good artist out there has some base that isn't simply anime, unless they have a knack for tracing and learning from that alone. But then they wouldn't be looking for art lessons.
If you aren't that serious of an artist though, I'm sorry for being harsh - but you shouldn't be looking into art classes if you only want one thing out of it. It's a waste of money, and a waste of time for the teacher.

Look... It's alright.. I was just really pissed off at my teacher for saying that my art wasn't art at all that day. Of course, I don't just draw anime/manga characters all the time. I draw other things too. :l I understand how everyone feels, but please... I'm going to do my best to do what I WANT to do.

No offense, it is an art form.

'It simply denotes the origin of a style, and defines NOTHING about the style'--in itself, could actually be a subject matter of an art. And as long as it has a subject, content and composition by any means understandable things could be understood as art. It could depend on the creator or the viewer. It has no limits at all.

It has an expression, a realm, a message, it conforms to some people's aesthetics. It has a technique no matter where the idea came from--people has certain techniques.

Art evolves you know. Before you knew it, your work would be different from how you want it to look like, consciously or unconsciously. You gain your identity.

It's not like you worked in 'ala mondrian', and your work wouldn't be considered art anymore.

Peace... ^^
again,no offense there. Just an art talk.

I said I was done with this thread, but the sheer level of faggotry I keep seeing prevents me from leaving it alone.
I'll keep my response simple and referential.

"Oh good lord. Is nobody listening? How many tl;dr posts do I need to make to drill it into your weeaboo skulls that you're missing the point entirely?"

Number 4 in this image

You also didn't read any part of the rest of the post, and I have no respect for your short-sighted response. Being a romanticist about the meaning of art does not make you correct, in light of the sheer ignorance you displayed.

In addition,
>>68 denotes that the thread's conversation is done with and needs no more 'contribution'