10 best anime about art that you should watch

Anime about art has depicted various artists, arts, and creative processes in insightful and entertaining ways over the years. Some anime provide a window into the dedication, struggles, and triumphs of being an artist, while others focus on the meaning and impact of art itself.

The anime about art on this list have their perspectives on these questions and more. Some spotlight passionate individual artists, while others reveal the creative workings of entire animation studios.

Every entry inspires viewers to pursue their own creative fire. Let's explore some of the best anime about art that you should watch.

Creative sparks: 10 must-watch anime about art

1) Barakamon

After punching an elderly curator over a harsh critique of his calligraphy, young prodigy Seishū Handa is sent by his father to a remote rural island. The slow-paced island life rekindles Seishū's creative passion. He befriends lively villagers, especially Naru Kotoishi, whose energy rekindles his creative spark.

This anime about art, Barakamon, beautifully blends comedy and poignant moments. Seeing Seishū form meaningful connections with local people and nature renews his creative spirit, after burning out on rigid discipline and artistic pressure.

As he shares calligraphy with Naru and other children, Seishū gradually realizes the communal roots beneath surface differences. Overall, this is an enriching anime about finding inspiration through human bonds.

2) Blue Period

Blue Period intimately depicts the all-consuming quest of Yatora Yaguchi to become a great artist, after discovering painting by chance in high school. Yatora prepares and takes entrance exams for the highly competitive Tokyo University of the Arts.

Through intense effort and confronting failures, he strives to develop his own style amongst brilliant but quirky peers, under an unorthodox teacher. Yatora's drastic life changes show the sacrifices and singular focus necessary to hone one's craft.

By insightfully examining the souls of its characters through their art, this anime about art provides a vivid window into the hopes, fears, and visions within the modern art world. It is an inspirational masterpiece about the pains and rewards of extreme dedication to one's creative output.

3) Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! (Image via Science SARU)

Midori Asakusa's wild imagination yearns to create animated worlds, which she conveys through incredible hand-drawn concepts. Her sophisticated classmate, Sayaka Kanamori, recognizes Midori's genius and helps navigate the student council's bureaucracy to get official recognition for their independent film club.

The pair recruit charismatic model, Tsubame Mizusaki, to produce creative short films. Eizouken!'s witty heroine trio embody the animation process itself— Midori as the endless ideation, Tsubame representing skilled hands bringing concepts to life, and Sayaka as the producer enabling it all.

Watching Eizouken!'s fanciful animated shorts appear is a visual feast. This meta-anime affectionately celebrates the labor and love behind animation's illusory magic.

4) Bakuman

Bakuman charts the rise of aspiring manga duo Moritaka Mashiro (art) and Akito Takagi (writing) from their teen years, publishing one-shots to eventually reaching their goal of an anime adaptation of their smash-hit manga, Reversi.

This fictional glimpse of the behind the scenes of the competitive manga industry reveals the immense dedication necessary to output popular serialized content on brutal weekly deadlines. We ride the emotional rollercoaster as our heroes strive through creative ruts, editorial clashes, falling sales, and more.

It's a thoroughly researched dramatization of the publishing process that inspires viewers to fight for their storytelling dreams.

5) Shirobako

Overworked production assistant Aoi Miyamori navigates the hectic schedules, staffing crises, and technical complexities threatening the completion of two anime projects at animation studio, Musashino.

Directed by Tsutomu Mizushima, Shirobako insightfully details all that goes on behind the scenes to successfully deliver even mediocre anime to fans. Like Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!, this anime is a meta-look at the logic-defying labor and problem-solving animators employ to wield their craft.

Watching characters scramble to meet demands reminds us not to take the anime we love for granted. It's an enlightening anime about art, revealing the intricacies behind seamless animation production and encouraging unfinished creative projects everywhere.

6) Princess Jellyfish

Princess Jellyfish (Image via Brain's Base)

Socially awkward aspiring illustrator Tsukimi Kurashita treasures jellyfish for their ephemeral beauty floating carefree, unlike her stressful life. Tsukimi and her offbeat female otaku housemates in the Amamizukan boarding house band together when developers threaten their beloved, but rundown, home.

It explores how we find self-confidence and belonging. Tsukimi encounters fashionable cross-dresser Kuranosuke Koibuchi, sparking both self-doubt and admiration. As they help each other blossom into their best selves, viewers witness wondrous transformations, like jellyfish gracefully emerging into the light.

This anime about art proves that with compassion, creativity, and courage, our differences make us beautiful.

7) Honey and Clover

Set at an arts college in Tokyo, this dramedy anime revolves around third-year sculpture major, Takemoto Yuuta, and his friends, chasing love, meaning, and their artistic ambitions on the cusp of adult independence.

Hagumi Hanamoto's prodigious talent contrasts Takemoto's initial lost direction, as he struggles to discover his creative calling amidst admiration and jealousy of brilliant peers. Witnessing these bonds form makes their inevitable separation bittersweet.

With empathy and humor, Honey and Clover compellingly captures the uncertainties of early adulthood, when changed relationships force reinvention of identity and purpose. Its messages about embracing life's contradictions in the process of becoming one's best self resonate universally.

8) Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo

Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo (Image via J.C. Staff)

Free-spirited artist Mashiro Shiina, incapable of caring for herself due to single-minded devotion to painting, gets placed in Sakurasou – Suimei University's dorm for exceptionally talented but unconventional students.

Super-talented yet unable to function under rigid societal standards, Mashiro upends the perspective of dutiful student Sorata Kanda, resident assistant to Sakurasou's oddballs. Seeing Sorata shift from judging abnormalities to appreciating unique gifts provides a thoughtful message.

Much like how some individuals with unique cognitive traits contribute to revolutionary ideas, Sakurasou suggests that neurological differences enabling extraordinary creativity deserve accommodation, not exclusion. This anime about art celebrates tolerance and the freedom to let creativity flourish.

9. Arte

In 16th-century Florence, when most women become wives or nuns, headstrong noblewoman Arte dreams of becoming a professional painter. She apprentices under renowned artist Leo, pushing against ingrained sexism.

Leo not only recognizes Arte's raw talent but also supports her ambitions during a time when female artists like Sofonisba Anguissola and Artemisia Gentileschi would eventually break barriers in history. While a period drama, Arte's themes of championing women overcoming barriers to follow their passion resonate today.

Besides the beautifully depicted European landscapes, seeing Arte glow sharing art's emotional resonance reminds us creative work is timeless nourishment for the soul. It's an empowering anime about art advocating that gifting the world our unique artistic voices can change history.

10) Sketchbook: Full Color's

Sketchbook: Full Color’s (Image via Hal Film Maker)

High school student Sora Kajiwara constantly sketches her surroundings, fantastical daydreams, fellow classmates, and more, in her ever-present sketchbook, while joining her school's art club.

Through a calm, observational storytelling style and vignettes solely featuring Sora's sketches, this anime immerses viewers in seeing daily life through an artist's eyes. Sketchbook captures the creative impulse to document the world's mundane yet magical moments.

Background art lush with detail suggests that inspiration perpetually surrounds us. Ultimately, this anime about art reminds us that simply bearing witness to life's beauty through our unique lens is in itself a creative act, leaving an artistic impact on the universe.

Conclusion

The anime about art on this list all offer refreshingly authentic perspectives on the meaning, making, and love of various art forms.

While some highlight formidable training processes to hone one's singular style or vision, others explore the interplay between art and relationships or identity, proving that bonds can profoundly shape artists and their works. Most importantly, these anime about art underscore that creativity in all its diverse expressions inherently enriches both its creators and audiences.

If art is ultimately capturing truth and beauty to touch people's hearts and minds, then all these inspirational anime about art certainly qualify as artworks themselves. Anyone who feels drawn to artistic fields or simply creating for its inherent rewards must watch these series.