National Taiwan Museum of Comics Audio Guide

National Taiwan Museum of Comics: what does the audio guide cover?

1. 01

   Welcome to National Taiwan Museum of Comics

   Welcome to the National Taiwan Museum of Comics, known in Chinese as 國家漫畫博物館. You are standing on Linsen Road in West District, Taichung, at the address of Linsen Road number 33. This is Taiwan's national-level museum of comics, and its home is a surprise: a historic compound that once belonged to the Taichung Prison. The museum is still growing. The east campus opened to visitors on the twenty-third of December in 2023, and a new building on the north side is planned for completion in 2028. So what you walk through today is a cluster of old wooden and brick buildings, reborn as galleries, reading rooms and exhibition halls. That contrast is the story of this place. Over the next few stops, we will follow how the museum found its site, step inside the drill hall, bathhouse and warden's residence, and then look at the comics themselves, from Taiwan's first hero to the collection now being built.

2. 02

   National Taiwan Museum of Comics: A Museum in Search of a Home

   Every museum has a founding story, and this one involved a long hunt for the right address. In 2017 Taiwan's Ministry of Culture began planning a national comics museum. In 2018 the work of preparing it was entrusted to the National Museum of Taiwan History, and in August 2020 a preparatory team was formed to organize events and start gathering a future collection. The first plan was to build in Taichung's Shuinan Economic and Trade Park. On the thirteenth of May in 2020, the ministry announced that plan had collapsed because the two sides could not agree on how to arrange the space. The city offered seven other possible sites, and a committee of scholars in comics and spatial planning was invited to evaluate them. In October 2020 the ministry named a former sugar company office and a group of railway warehouses as the chosen base. Then the plan changed again. On the first of April in 2023, the Taichung Prison compound was confirmed as the museum's site, with the Ministry of Culture covering the cost. The land and buildings, 2.75 hectares in all, were transferred to the ministry at no charge between June and August. Renovation began in September, and the preparatory office was founded on the twentieth of October.

3. 03

   National Taiwan Museum of Comics: Drill Hall, Bathhouse and Warden's Home

   Now let us look at the buildings, because here the architecture is half the exhibition. The east campus holds 15 historic buildings, and several are protected. The drill hall was completed in 1937, in the Showa era of Japanese rule. Prison officers practiced judo and kendo here. It is the best-preserved drill hall in Taichung, and it was registered as a historic building in 2004. Its design is solemn and symmetrical. A shrine niche sits at the center of the rear wall, with the judo hall on its left and the kendo hall on its right. The bathhouse has a quirky origin. Staff dormitories built from 1903 onward had no bathrooms inside, so a shared bathhouse was set up nearby. It is a single-story wooden building, designated a Taichung city monument in 2013. Today it serves as a showcase for Taiwanese comics. The largest residence in the group was the prison warden's home. It is described as the best-preserved freestanding wooden official residence in Taiwan. Inside, an exhibition titled "When Taiwan Comics Become a Spectrum" traces how Japanese manga inspired Taiwanese comics, which then developed local character and reached into animation and games.

4. 04

   National Taiwan Museum of Comics: Heroes, Manuscripts and a Rental Bookshop

   Inside these old walls lives a growing collection. The museum has gathered more than 15,000 items from Taiwan and abroad, including more than 10,000 magazines and books and about 4,000 original manuscripts. Seeing a hand-drawn page up close is a different experience from reading it in print. Exhibitions here rotate, but the themes are rich. The drill hall has shown award-winning Taiwanese comics under the title "The Magic Moment of Taiwan Comics", with manuscripts by creators including Liu Xingqin, Hsu Mao-sung, Yu Lung-hui and Hsiao Yen-chung. One exhibition has also gathered more than 100 comic books on Indigenous themes, in partnership with the National Library of Public Information. Then there is Zhuge Siliang, Taiwan's first hero comic and, for many children, their first hero. Its author, Ye Hongjia, would have turned 100 in 2024, and the museum marked the anniversary. If you want a slower moment, look for the retro rental bookshop, styled after the old days of comic reading. Its books are for reading inside the building only.

5. 05

   Before You Head Off

   As you wander the grounds, keep two layers in mind: the compound's earlier life as part of the Taichung Prison, and its new life as a home for comics. Notice how a drill hall, a bathhouse and an officer's residence now hold stories drawn by hand. A few practical pointers. The museum can be reached on foot in about 10 to 15 minutes from Taichung Railway Station or Wuquan Station. Pets are welcome in the outdoor areas on a leash or in a stroller, but not inside the historic buildings. The service center building has lockers you can register to use. Because exhibitions change and the museum is still expanding, no two visits will be quite the same. Is there a building you skipped, a manuscript you want to see again, or a corner of the compound that looks different at dusk? Wander back and see what has changed.