According to dictionary.com anime is “a Japanese style of motion-picture animation, characterized by highly stylized, colorful art, futuristic settings, violence, and sexuality”. Most people think that art much be set to be a certain form like paintings, sculptures, drawings. Anime usually won’t come to one’s mind when the term “art” is mentioned. Though this is the case, anime can’t be neglected as just any children cartoon a kid watch day to day or TV screen with moving figures. Anime is a serious art form. It is a unique kind of art by itself. It combines all aspects and kind of art to form the art of animation. Animation will be considered a serious form of visual art.

The term “visual art” refers to anything that “is primarily visual in nature” (1). Visual art usually includes printmaking, painting, photography, drawings and filmmaking. Animation includes most of the above mentioned art forms so it can definitely be considered art. First, animation is the art of filmmaking. Anime movies had been included as an award category in many big countries which means that many other professional artists considered animation to be part of filmmaking. Each of the anime cartoons has its own unique story and message that it want to bring across. Animation is a movie art.

Second, animation is a form of drawing because all anime comes originally from drawings either by hand or computer. By definition, drawing is “the creation of artistic pictures or diagrams” (2). Anime moves from scene to scene throughout its stories and scenes are created in the process. Throughout one anime series, the animator presented over a thousand of sceneries pictures to the audience. Also, there’s the creation of stories’ characters and their designs of clothing, weapons, etc. After one anime, there’s unexpected amount of images created.

Although there are many characters in one anime, some think that the characters are more or less the same looks making it lacks the important element of creativity in it. But, if one study animation harder, one will realize that animation is full of creativities. There are creative differences in animation that can help the audience differentiate the characters easily. For example, the anime characters, Doraemon and Hello Kitty are good examples. These two characters are intended to be cats when it was first drawn, but Hello Kitty’s eye is two solid black ovals while Doraemon’s eyes are two big white ovals with a black oval shape inside each of these ovals. Hello Kitty has two ears while Doraemon is a character with no ears. One might think that cats should have ears, but the author solves this question by mentioning in episode of the animation that Doraemon’s ears got bit off by a mouse. Therefore, animation can be full of creativities and unique drawings.

Anime is a form of visual arts and it is just as important as the other widely known forms. Animation combines many effects and aspects in its creation, so many kind of art embedded in animation, anime is definitely a serious art form. If one says animation is not a serious art form, then that person is neglecting any sort visual arts as a serious form of art.