Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha

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For almost a year now, Toranoana has been having gallery exhibitions of popular artists. At these events you can buy a large B4-size pamphlets that include the works on display in book format. Alpha’s gallery was the most recent one, running from May 19th to the 28th. The amusingly titled Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha was the companion pamphlet.

Like with Tony Taka’s T2 Gallery, Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha is also B4 size, but it isn’t hardcover. Instead it’s softcover, and staple-bound with a slip on cover. It’s 64 pages in total.

Through some bad timing on my part, I received AKABEi SOFT2 Illustrations Collection and Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha at the same time. The content overlap seemed even more extreme since it was so fresh in my memory. Thankfully, the repeated illustrations feature in tiny dimensions in AKABEi SOFT2 Illustrations Collection. So both purchases make sense.

In fact, a lot of the best AKABEi SOFT2 illustrations are in this pamphlet. Another plus is that it features the AKABEi SOFT2 Illustrations Collection cover girl from Okiba ga Nai! in a new illustration that isn’t in the memorial art book.

The illustrations in the Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha that weren’t AKABEi SOFT2 related were either Toranoana originals, or Alpha’s original illustrations. To be clear, only nine of her original illustrations are in this collection. Five Toranoana illustrations that didn’t feature AKABEi SOFT2 characters also appear. Many of the Toranoana and AKABEi SOFT2 cross promotional illustrations show up. Most were also in the memorial art book, though in smaller sizes.

I’m really becoming a fan of these large-sized doujinshi and art books. It looks better and I’m buying art books for the style, presentation, and quality. Since Pictures at an Exhibition of Alpha only sold at the gallery exhibition, you’ll have to go through Yahoo! Japan Auctions or Mandarake to find it. Either way, if you’re just looking for a nice collection of Alpha’s illustrations, this is the best option.